Disorder
by Kohadril
Summary: Order is the fragile illusion of control...a lie we tell ourselves by necessity, because the reality of our impermanence and futility is maddening. What happens to a man who looks upon the face of entropy?
1. Prologue

_Author's Notes:_

Disorder_ has been a labor of many months. I started this project in May of this year, and promptly forgot about it when graduation gave way to a difficult job. As you might imagine, my work schedule became very rigorous, and it became almost impossible for me to find time to write._

_Eventually, though, I adjusted to the schedule, and started to write again. So far I have finished this brief prologue and drafts of the first three (much longer) chapters. Those of you who read _Hunter/Killer _will no doubt recognize many of my tropes and crutch words in this piece; but I hope you will also find it refreshingly different. Rest assured I will find a way to work action and comedy into this plot, but the focus of this piece is horror. Not just suspense, not just visceral grotesquery, but true existential horror. Fans of angst and pain will not be disappointed either, for the things that terrify us most are quite emotionally charged._

_Before I present my work, allow me to reveal some insecurities. I am not sure that this work will be enjoyable. I have never written horror: I am trying to expand my horizons. I fully intend to scare the crap out of you, but if I fail, I hope I at least do so entertainingly. _

_I would like to thank Lady Ophelia for her comments on my initial outline of this piece. Alas, she has not had time to beta for the bulk of this work—at least, not yet. As a result, I have turned to _wolfschild_ for my edits and suggestions on this prologue and the chapters I have thus far written. Wolfy, thank you for all your help._

_I am posting the first part of this on Halloween because I believe it to be a uniquely suitable date. If that is pretension (it is) then I am pretentious. I will post Chapter 1 by Friday of this week. After that, I shall try to keep my schedule consistent. I may not always succeed, but unlike with _Hunter/Killer, _I am starting out ahead._

_Thank you all for your patience. I hope you enjoy _Disorder.

_**It sleeps  
In the unplumbed depths;  
In forgotten tombs where lie  
Secrets ancient and unutterable,  
Dark places that devour light  
As fire blackens wood.**_

_**It watches  
Sleek and predatory  
And hungry like a shark,  
Hidden beneath our vision; stirring  
To the taste of order and drinking deep  
To slake its horrid thirst.**_

_**It waits  
In cacophonic torpor  
For the stars to align at the**_  
**_Appointed Hour, when madness will reign,  
When the earth will tremble and split_**  
_**And it will be reborn.  
**_

_**It sleeps,  
And it dreams of ruin.**_

_Disorder_

There are terrible things in the dark, things that hate us, that wish us ill. But the most terrible things are those with agendas so utterly alien, so completely monstrous, that they deny us any significance at all.

Prologue

They were close. Outside the house. He knew it, he could feel them near. The worst part was that he couldn't see them. He could never see them. He could hear them: their taunting, wordless whispers; the rustle of hurried footsteps through the dry grass outside his windows. But he _couldn't see them_. How long had they been following him? A few weeks? They'd harried him to the point of near insanity. Driven his wife and children away. Gotten him fired from a job he'd held for fifteen years. And he'd never so much as seen their faces.

He moved to the window above the kitchen counter and peered out over the nightscape of his front lawn. It was brown and matted from weeks of neglect. Overgrown hedges shuddered in the wind. No one. Nothing. They had to be there. He'd just heard them and if they weren't there—where were they? If he could just see them…maybe he could talk to them, reason with them. Maybe they wouldn't be so fearful.

There was a sensation like a gentle breath on the back of his neck, a glint of movement at the edge of his vision and he spun around with a startled cry. A gaunt shadow darted out of view. Light footfalls sounded on the hardwood floor. His heart raced and he felt his stomach contract as adrenaline poured into his system.

They were inside.

He grabbed the first weapon he could find, a long knife resting on the Formica counter-top, and held it menacingly out in front of him. He slowly backed up into the corner of the kitchen as the whispers built to crescendo. He could almost understand them now, almost make out the words. He strained his ears, despite his terror, because he needed to know.

"_We want it."_

The whispered voice felt like it came from just inches away. He gasped and dropped to the floor, looking about frantically as he pressed himself further into the corner. Want what? What did they want? He couldn't think of anything he wouldn't give them just to make this stop.

"What do you want?" he screamed into the night as a panicked tear rolled down his cheek. There was no answer, and he began to cry. He hadn't cried since he was fourteen years old. He furiously wiped away the tears with his left hand while clutching the knife close to him with his right.

The shadows around the square of moonlit floor shifted and drew in, closing around him. Silhouettes of long arms and lean bodies danced in and out of the light to the rhythm of the soft thuds and floorboard creaks. He pulled his knees up and hugged his arms around his chest, his grip on the knife now white-knuckled.

"Please just tell me what you want," he whimpered.

"_We want it."_

The sound went through his body like a shock. This whisper was louder. Closer. Every muscle tensed. He couldn't take it anymore, not seeing them, not knowing what they wanted, but he was too terrified to get up and chase after them. He had to do something, but he couldn't find the strength. He started to sob uncontrollably.

A pale, long-fingered hand stretched towards him out of the darkness and he recoiled, pressing himself further into the corner as he struggled through shuddering breaths. The thing stepped into the moonlight, tall and impossibly thin, ivory-skinned and draped in charcoal cloth.

He looked up at its face.

It did not have one.

He screamed.

Other creatures, like the first, came into the light around their leader, their furtive whispers all the more terrifying for their lack of mouths. They seemed to plead with the first one, their gestures and movements submissive but expectant as they begged it for something. The leader held its eyeless gaze on him. It made a gesture and the lesser creatures became silent, turning their featureless heads to the man bawling in the corner.

The leader stepped lightly forward and extended a long finger, pointing at the man's abdomen.

"_We want it."_

A heavy feeling shot through the man's stomach as he felt the thing inside of him. He didn't remember...yes...he had felt it there before. It had never seemed like anything, or bothered him—that's why he hadn't thought about it. Or had he? Had it been there? Yes, it had to have been. That's the only thing that made sense.

He finally understood. His tears stopped as he realized what he had to do.

He drove the knife into his own stomach and cut a wide gash. He barely felt it. The alien things looked on silently, their whispers having died. He cut and hacked within himself and dropped the knife to the floor. He pushed his hand into the warm and bleeding remnants of his intestines, feeling around, exploring his innards for what was out of place. His lap grew wet from the blood and excrement seeping from the wound.

He found it, seconds later, a grey bag with a fleshy texture, covered in his blood. He tore it from himself and held it up to the creatures. They were nowhere to be found.

As his vision dimmed he began to feel the pain, and he realized that he had just made a terrible mistake.

* * *

Dean pulled on his jeans as he stumbled out of the bathroom, hair still wet from the shower. He found Sam wide awake, sitting up in his bed with the blue comforter bundled tightly around him, staring at the screen of the laptop in front of him.

"Latest news from Jeremiah, Nebraska: a middle-aged man disembowels himself in his own home." Sam looked up at Dean with those glinting 'I told you so' eyes. When his eyes flashed like that he looked almost ridiculously young, like a ten-year-old with prepubescent gigantism.

"Suicides happen all the time," Dean dismissed as he wriggled into a shirt. "Now get your clothes on, we're headed to Oregon."

"Not in Jeremiah," Sam replied, ignoring Dean's order. "There's like, 11,000 people there. Four months into the year and they've already had five times the suicides they had _all_ of last year."

"So that's what, a total of five?" Dean snarked. Sam looked at him annoyedly and Dean realized, with not a little pleasure, that he was right. "Maybe it's been rainy and everybody is depressed."

"But they're not just suicides. They're weird suicides. You want to kill yourself, you jump off a bridge or shoot yourself in the head. The guy who disemboweled himself? They found him holding his own kidney." Sam looked back up at Dean with an incredibly inappropriate grin. He was like a puppy that had somehow been trained to bring home the most disgusting things he could find. Dean resisted the urge to smack him on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper.

"Sometimes weird stuff happens. It doesn't mean something supernatural is going on." Dean hardened his face, hoping Sam would take the hint. "There's a real ghost thing happening in Oregon—"

"That's over a thousand miles away! Jeremiah's _maybe_ a hundred and twenty." He looked up at his brother pleadingly, and when Dean found himself unable to immediately refuse, Sam took the initiative, speaking quickly and excitedly. "The last guy, the guy I told you about yesterday? Smacked his head against a brick wall like fifteen times before the hemorrhaging killed him. The woman before _him_ locked herself in a closet until she died of dehydration…"

"Fine!" Dean shouted. "Fine, Sam. We'll stop there for one day. See what we can find. Okay?"

Sam smiled at him and nodded as he rolled out of bed and started putting on his clothes.

"Wipe that stupid little smirk off your face before I flatten it."

"I'd like to see you try, shorty." Sam leaned over and patted his older brother's head, some four inches lower than his own. Dean slapped the hand away.

"Hey, stretch. I'm average, you're the freak."

"I'm sorry, you'll have to speak louder, I can't hear you way up here." Sam turned away from Dean as he fastened his jeans, but Dean could practically see the smugness, and he was not in the habit of tolerating sass. He leapt forward and tackled Sam, slamming him face-first into the ground.

"Ow! Ow! Fuck! Ow!" Sam whined as Dean punched him in the ribs, over and over again. "Dude! Sneak attacks aren't cool! Agh!"

"It's like the Boy Scouts, bitch. 'Be Prepared.'" He laced an arm around Sam's neck and applied the choke. Sam struggled uselessly against the hold while Dean squeezed. It was several seconds before Sam reached out a hand and tapped the floor twice to submit.

Dean loosened his grip and Sam coughed. Dean continued: "I mean, calling me short and then turning your back? How stupid are you?"

He released his brother and stood. Sam rolled over and Dean offered his hand, smirking condescendingly. Sam glared at him, embarrassed and vengeful, and got to his feet on his own.

Dean made a mental note not to turn his back on Sam for several days.


	2. PreSymptomatic

_Author's Notes: _

_I disclaim the universe of "Supernatural," and everything that is not original to this work._

_I want to thank all those of you who reviewed the prologue; your kind words are truly inspirational. I'd also like to thank my beta, Wolfschild, for pointing out how many times I used the word "expression" in the first draft I sent (it was freaking unbelievable). _

_I hope you all enjoy Chapter 1,_

_Kohadril_

Disorder

Chapter 1: Pre-Symptomatic

Eight miles outside of Jeremiah, and Sam was trying hard to be angry at Dean. It wasn't going well.

Certainly, he was embarrassed about how one-sided their little tussle had been. But that just didn't outweigh the fact that Sam hadn't seen his brother's spirits this high since before their father had died. He was willing to take a playful beating if it meant that Dean could smile and _mean_ it.

Of course, Dean couldn't be allowed to know that Sam wasn't mad. Half the fun of beating on one's brother was how pissed off it made him, and Sam didn't want to rob Dean of that. He hadn't spoken a word to Dean—not one word—since they'd gotten into the car. And that shit-eating grin had rarely left his brother's face.

"So, Sammy, are you ever going to talk to me again? Or did I hurt your little girly feelings?" Dean needled, pulling Sam out of his space-gaze. Sam turned to him deliberately, face flush with the kind of hatred only brotherly love can breed.

"Just keep talking, asshat; yours is coming," Sam said quietly, the threat under his words as convincing as he could make it. In reality, it was all he could do not to laugh out loud.

"Oh no! Little Sammy's gonna get me!"

"Shut up," Sam mumbled.

"No really, I'm terrified."

"SHUT UP."

"In fact, I think I just pissed myself," Dean's grin was so cocky Sam had to look away to keep from punching him then and there. That's when he saw the police cars.

"Stop the car!" Sam shouted.

"What, you wanna do this now?"

"Roadblock! Stop the car!" Sam pressed himself back against the seat.

Dean looked up, wide-eyed, and hit the brakes.

* * *

The opportunity for revenge had come sooner than Sam had expected, but quick thinking had allowed him to take full advantage of it.

"I cannot believe you fucking did that," Dean whined as he dropped down into the driver's seat, pulling the door closed emphatically.

"You're the one who called me a bitch in front of the police officer."

"Yeah, well, you're the one who decided that the correct answer to the question 'does he always talk to you like that?' was 'only when he's drunk.'"

"In my defense, it was hilarious," Sam replied in a comfortable drawl, grinning broadly. "You should just be glad he had a breathalyzer. You can't recite the alphabet backwards for shit."

Dean sighed deeply, looked out the window, then back at Sam with a grudging smile.

"Yeah, okay. That was pretty good." He paused. "Even?"

"Even. So what the hell is the roadblock about?"

"Quarantine."

"Seriously?"

"Seriously." Dean looked over at Sam with sincerity. "Good catch, Sammy."

Shockingly, the 'I told you so' Dean had expected did not materialize. Sam took a breath, held it for a beat, and then blew it out.

"We have got to get in there."

Dean looked at Sam appraisingly. Something was up with him. Sam looked back with a puzzled 'what?' on his face. Dean turned back to the windshield, deciding to drop it for the moment.

"Yeah. It looks like we're taking the long way around."

* * *

It had just kind of hit him, as they'd sat there at the edge of town. An annoyingly vague feeling of unease. It kept him occupied, and silent, even as Dean navigated the circuitous rural roads. He tried to ignore it, but it was frustratingly prevalent.

"Sammy. You alright?" Dean asked genuinely, his eyes flashing the tiniest shimmer of worry; the most his normal façade would ever allow. Sam shook himself out of his thoughts.

"Yeah, I'm fine," he defended instinctually.

"'Cause you kinda had the thousand-yard stare thing going on there," Dean pushed.

It took Sam a moment to decide if it was worth it. He looked up at Dean just in time to see another flicker of concern.

"I feel a little weird."

"You _are_ a little weird," Dean replied good-naturedly. Sam almost got mad, but again he found himself enjoying Dean's humor.

"That explains it then," Sam said, completely deadpan.

Dean laughed and Sam smiled to himself. The feeling hung in the air for a minute. Then Dean's eyes shifted back to near-concern, and his tone followed suit.

"What do you mean, 'weird'?"

"Just anxious, I guess. I can't figure it out."

"This a psychic thing?"

Sam's stomach lurched at the idea. Dean couldn't know, Sam decided, should never be _allowed_ to know, how much that question scared him.

"I don't think so. I don't have a headache or anything," Sam said, trying to mask his uncertainty.

"Okay. Then what does it mean? Bad bacon cheeseburger?"

"Yeah, must be," Sam said tiredly as he turned back to the window.

* * *

Jeremiah was the kind of town you could love the idea of. It had that rural, small town aesthetic that people find inexplicably compelling: brick buildings and bright red fire hydrants, a four-by-four grid posing as a downtown. It seemed like there was a church on every corner. A bulwark against evil if ever there was one.

Sam and Dean knew better. Evil things didn't favor the godless cities over the pious villages, and they sure as hell didn't fear the Cross.

They stopped at the first motel they found, a joint that was seedy enough to be suitably cheap. They tossed some stuff in the room and set off to investigate.

* * *

Sam's anxiety hadn't gotten any better since they'd gotten into town. In fact, it had gotten progressively worse. He had decided not to tell Dean. Okay, that wasn't precisely true. In point of fact, he was too chicken-shit to tell Dean. His growing suspicion that this was indeed some kind of 'psychic thing' was seriously freaking him out, and he didn't want to risk that Dean would come to the same conclusion. As long as he didn't say it out loud—as long as _Dean_ didn't say it out loud—he could pretend it wasn't true.

Except he had to tell Dean. This could be some kind of warning. Maybe they were in danger. He started to open his mouth as Dean braked at a stop sign.

Wait. What the fuck was he going to say? If this was a psychic thing, it was a pretty goddamn useless one. His feelings of weirdness weren't exactly _actionable_. They didn't change the situation or their level of knowledge. Yeah, they told Sam that something was fucking wrong with this place. But one could easily come to the same conclusion merely by noting that a guy had ripped out his own kidney the day before, and the town was now under a strict (if admittedly porous) quarantine.

He barely noticed the car slide to a stop. He felt Dean's fist smack his arm, not hard, just enough to get his attention.

"Hey Captain Oblivious," Dean snarked.

"What?" Sam responded peevishly, before noting their new surroundings.

"We're here. Kidney-Dude's place." Dean turned to pull of his seatbelt.

The moment Sam looked up and saw the house the question was settled. The anxiety spiked to the level of phobic dread. His stomach knotted and his heart rate jumped. He couldn't control it, couldn't push it down. He shuddered deeply and his body just kept trembling. He could hardly keep his breath.

"Dean," he breathed through gritted teeth.

* * *

Dean turned back to Sam, froze for a beat, then leapt into action.

"Sam!" he exclaimed, grabbing his brother's shoulder. He tried to pull them face to face, but Sam yanked his body away. Shit. He should have seen that coming. Sam bent over, burying his face between his arms. Dean withdrew a little, then put a gentler hand on Sam's back. He could feel just how hard the kid was shaking, how fast his heart was beating, how shallow his breathing was. Dean's stomach sank.

"What is it Sam? Vision?"

"No," Sam choked. "I have no fucking idea what it is."

Sam sucked in another whimpering breath. He was close to hyperventilation.

"Breathe, Sammy," Dean said, with some sternness, pushing harder against Sam's back and leaning in over him. "Come on man. In and out."

Sam choked on a few more breaths before he started to find a rhythm. The tremors began to fade as his breathing improved. In a few moments he'd calmed down considerably. Dean withdrew his hand and pulled away. Sam sat up and glanced his way, before he'd had time to compose himself, and Dean saw real terror in his eyes. In a second, Sam realized how naked he was and he looked away shamefully. He took a few more breaths before turning back to his brother with a desperate attempt at a brave smile.

"I think this might be a psychic thing," he admitted tentatively.

"You think?" Dean chortled sarcastically. Sam looked down again, and Dean immediately wished he hadn't laughed. He waited for a moment, giving Sam a little more time to collect himself.

"You wanna scrub this? We can just leave," Dean offered. Sam looked up at him hopefully.

"You won't call me a wuss?"

Dean shook his head slowly, _not even a hint of judgment here, bro_. Sam looked ready to agree. Then something happened; something that Dean wasn't expecting. Sam looked over at the house and took a deep, long breath.

"No," Sam said shakily. "No. We can't leave. We're going into that house."

He turned back to Dean, eyes still uncertain but now also determined. Dean was impressed, and he allowed his face to show it. A sheepish half-smile from Sam let him know the message was received.

They broke eye contact to start collecting their equipment.

* * *

After the viciousness of the panic attack, Sam was surprised to find that the anxiety was virtually gone as they mounted the steps to the home of the late Jacob Carson.

He was relieved, not just because the feeling was gone, but because frankly, he was tired of this. Really freaking tired of it. There was no question: these 'powers' were more trouble than they were worth. They proved useful only very rarely, and even then they were painful and traumatic. And when they made him lose control of himself, like they just had, they were also pretty humiliating. He had fought, long and hard, to get Dean to accept him as an adult who could take care of himself. Shit like this undermined him, made him feel helpless, and made Dean see him that way.

Dean cut the police tape and started to pick the lock. He would, of course, deny that this stuff made him treat Sam any different. The fact that his older brother couldn't go fifteen seconds without looking at him suggested otherwise.

One little psychic episode and he goes from being a partner to being a burden.

Again, that wasn't the word Dean would have used. Sam understood that Dean didn't see taking care of him as a burden. He saw it as a responsibility of kinship. Whatever one called it, the more Dean had to worry about Sam, the less he could focus on the job. Sometimes—okay, often—Sam wondered if the two of them together were any more effective than Dean had been alone. Sure, Sam had saved Dean's life on more than one occasion. But how many of those times had Dean's life been in danger in the first place because of Sam?

That wasn't all Sam had to worry about. Dean wasn't handling their father's death well. He had developed a tendency to throw himself into the hunt harder than was healthy. Sam had been helping him through it, and on more than one occasion had actually made him acknowledge what he was doing. It was still a work in progress, though, and Dean didn't need more excuses to sideline Sam and go it alone.

This wasn't something he should be thinking about right now. Dean was almost in, and he needed to give the job his full attention. Sam pulled the video camera out of the pocket of his heavy brown jacket. He flipped the LCD open and checked the infrared.

"Got it," Dean called. He turned the knob and the door swung open. Then, hero that he was, Dean went in first, scanned the room, and, absurdly, beckoned Sam with an 'all clear' gesture. Sam sighed. No. Dean wasn't going overboard at _all_.

It was a generic development home, which was something of a rarity in such a rural community. Sam knew that the victim had been one of the town's few professionals; a lawyer at a local firm specializing in water rights and land-use issues. He also knew he'd recently been fired. There were pictures on the walls of family members not mentioned in any of the police reports, and Sam vaguely remembered reading that his family had moved out some time ago, due to a sudden change in Mr. Carson's behavior.

"No EMF," Dean noted, sweeping his home-rigged sensor back and forth.

"No heat signatures," Sam replied as he scanned the lens across the length of the parlor. He gestured with the camera to the hall behind Dean. "It went down in the kitchen."

Sam could feel Dean's eyes linger on him for a moment, and Sam knew he was just waiting for him to crack. To freak out again. He could feel it. It was aggravating, and it was condescending, and it was…completely fucking reasonable, considering what had just happened. Damn it.

He didn't know why he wanted to be mad at Dean, but it seemed more productive than being mad at…what? His powers? Himself? Fuck it. He was just annoyed, generally speaking.

Dean led them into the kitchen, taking a moment to sweep the EMF detector over the crusted remnants of the blood pool. He shook his head and moved out of the way to let Sam scan it for thermals.

As Sam brought the camera up, he started to feel pressure building behind his eyes.

_Oh fuck. Not now. Anytime but now..._

It was on him in an instant, a sharp, blinding, all-too-familiar pain that brought him to his knees.

* * *

"SAM!" Dean shouted, for the second time in the last fifteen minutes.

"Sam? Are you alright? Tell me what's happening," Dean demanded. He dropped down and grabbed Sam by the arms. Second time in fifteen minutes—this town was really fucking with his brother. "You need to tell…"

"Shut up Dean," Sam responded curtly, through hard breaths. "I'm trying to concentrate."

Dean pulled back a little, surprised at Sam's seeming control of the situation. He did as he was told, but he didn't lighten his grip. Holding on to Sam during a vision made him feel slightly less useless. Sam looked down, and Dean almost lost sight of his face behind his brother's shaggy bangs.

"He's hiding…running from something. They've been chasing him for a long time," Sam said, the sentence punctuated with a groan. "They're here. I mean, they were here. It's weird. Aah. I'm seeing what happened last night."

"That's good Sammy. Keep talking," Dean said, staring up at the ceiling because he had no fucking idea what to say at times like this. Sam gasped in pain.

"And…uh. I think I see them. One of them. It's tall, light-skinned," Sam paused. "Now there are lots of them."

Dean could feel Sam shudder.

"Dean they don't have any faces."

Sam seemed to still in his arms. His grimace seemed to lighten. That was all, Dean guessed.

Wrong.

After a moment's calm Sam shivered violently.

"Oh shit, Dean," he breathed.

Sam jolted out of Dean's grip, falling to the floor and clutching his abdomen. He screamed. Not a half-assed scream. Not a loud yell. A real, blood-curdling scream. The kind of scream normally reserved for the loss of a limb. Or some internal organs.

"Sam? Sam?" Dean called, more panicked by the second. _Oh fuck fuck fuck what do I do?_ Sam curled up into the fetal position and continued to cry as hard as his lungs would allow.

"Dean! Fuck! Dean you've got to make it stop!" Sam begged. Egoless. Prideless. Helpless.

Dean couldn't refuse that, but he was short on ideas. Then he thought of something. God he didn't want to do it, but it was better than letting Sam lie there in agony. He came up behind his brother and pulled Sam's back up against his chest. Sam bucked and jerked; not against Dean, but against the pain he couldn't find relief from. Dean restrained him as best he could before putting his right arm across his brother's neck.

"Okay, kid. I'm going to choke you out. When you wake up, you'll be in the car."

Sam seemed to doubt this course of action for a moment, but then another wave of pain hit. He squealed and kicked and nearly pulled himself out of Dean's grip, but when he finally regained enough control to do so, he nodded emphatically, so Dean could not mistake his agreement.

Without hesitation Dean began to squeeze, restricting the flow of blood through Sam's carotid artery. Sam clenched his jaw against the pain and stilled as best he could. He was trying to make things easy, Dean thought, but Sam's resistance wasn't what was making this hard. Dean felt his movements slow and his muscles relax. It was against his every instinct to hold on, but he did. He held on until Sam's eyes slid closed. Held on until that ugly grimace faded. Held on, for a few more seconds that seemed like forever, until his brother's body went limp.

Then he carefully released him, cradling his head. He checked Sam's pulse; there was always a risk, however small, with something like this. It was solid and strong.

He looked at the kid's face, tear-marked but now peaceful, and had the briefest moment of weakness.

"God, Sammy," he whispered sorrowfully.

Then he lifted his brother up over his shoulder and carried him out the door.

End Chapter 1


	3. Prodromal Stage

_I now have two betas, and much to my amusement they occasionally give me conflicting advice. The finished product is in part attributable to the editing and suggestions of Wolfschild and K. Hanna Korossy. They both deserve considerable thanks for their efforts. Also, if either of you find any of your suggestions not followed, I fully intend to blame the other for contradicting you._

_Thank you all for reviewing; I'm pleased you find this work entertaining. It's especially flattering to hear that people actually anticipate updates—I'll try not to disappoint._

_Neither this chapter nor the next will have a lot of action or horror. You can bet that I will get to those things. Still, what happens in this chapter especially is extremely important—we see the beginnings of the central challenge of the story. This will pay off considerably. Believe me when I say that if you find something weird, there's a reason for that._

Disorder

Chapter 2: Prodromal Stage

Sam woke up a few seconds after Dean loaded him into the car, but he didn't open his eyes. He didn't even open his eyes when Dean slid down into the driver's seat and put two fingers on his throat, checking his pulse for what Sam assumed to be the third or fourth time in the last few minutes. Sam played unconscious because he didn't want to see his brother's face. He didn't want to have another mortifying conversation about his "gifts." He didn't want to know how much heavier this made the load Dean was already carrying, and how much less Dean was going to let him shoulder now.

Of course, he couldn't avoid it forever. Being choked like that could only knock someone out for a few minutes if it was done right. If he continued to feign unconsciousness, Dean would start to suspect he'd damaged Sam's brain. And Sam didn't really want to make things worse.

_Come on, Sam, _he thought. _Be a man._

Sam opened his eyes slowly, and, as he well expected, Dean immediately noticed.

"Sammy. How're you doing?"

"Fine," Sam said quietly. There was a long silence as Dean sized him up, evaluating his claim.

"I'm a little tired," Sam amended. At the very best, that was an understatement. Every muscle in his body felt overworked. He was sore and weak.

"I'm taking you back to the motel," Dean said.

"I had a vision, Dean; I've had them before. This isn't that big a deal," Sam answered wearily.

"Yeah, well, you've never had a vision where you felt your guts being ripped out before."

Sam sighed. "You figured that out?"

"I may not be as smart as you are, Sammy, but you told me you were seeing what happened last night, and suddenly you were rolling on the ground screaming, grabbing at your stomach. Those dots aren't hard to connect," Dean groused.

"Look, I'm alright Dean. Just give me a few minu—"

"You felt the guy die!" Dean erupted. "And I'm not fucking blind. You're not okay, you're exhausted. I've never seen you look like this after a vision. You're going to bed." Dean took his eyes off the road just long enough to give his brother a stone-faced look. _This is not a discussion_.

"You stopped it before he died," Sam said quietly, not even trying to hide the gratitude.

Dean didn't respond for a moment, but Sam saw relief flash in his eyes. "Still."

Sam considered resisting further. He wanted to fight. He wanted to show his brother he was strong enough to do this job, no matter what it threw at him. He wanted to win back some of the credibility he'd lost. But he was just too damned tired.

He let his head fall back onto the headrest and closed his eyes.

* * *

Dean needed to be outside, but he wasn't quite ready to leave Sam alone yet, so he'd worked out a compromise. He leaned against the wall just outside the motel room door, under the dilapidated maple awning. The door was cracked open.

Sam had passed out almost as soon as his head had hit the pillow. He'd barely even put up a fight in the car, Dean reflected; the kid needed rest. Then again, what the hell was he thinking putting up any fight at all? Two psychic freak-outs in a day? He'd better believe Dean was pulling him out of the fire.

Honestly, Dean wasn't sure if he was more put off that Sam had resisted even a little, or that he hadn't resisted more. The first made him angry, the second made him nervous. He gave the kid shit for it, but he needed Sam to challenge him. It had taken him a while to see it, but he finally had, and for the first time in months he'd begun to feel like he had a shot at recovery. For the first time in his _life_ he'd let his brother shoulder some of the weight, and it was really, truly helping. He wasn't ready for Sam to be this vulnerable again.

Wait, what the hell was this? He didn't have any right to be feeling this way. He wasn't the one this town was torturing, he was not the victim here. Sam was. Sam, the only family he had left. Sam, who he'd been leaning on instead of protecting.

Fuck. This was his fault. Dean could have called it off after the panic attack. He could have taken Sam back right then, and investigated the house himself. Of course, they never would have gotten the information Sam picked up from the vision, but Dean didn't see the price as particularly fair. They'd have figured it out eventually without all the screaming.

Boy had that ever taken him by surprise. He'd literally never heard Sam scream like that before. He hadn't known he was capable of it.

Well, he was done. He was done letting Sam push himself, done leaning on him, done putting him in danger. Sam was safe for now; Dean might as well use the time effectively. The sooner he figured this out, the sooner this stuff would stop happening to his brother. He pulled the door closed and locked it.

Quarantines didn't happen without sick people. Somebody at the hospital would have some information.

* * *

The hospital was new and well-appointed. Dean guessed that it was the central facility for Jeremiah as well as the smaller surrounding towns.

Bluffing his way in wasn't particularly difficult—he still had his fake CDC badge and a Glen-Plaid monkey-suit—but he was worried about getting any of the doctors to talk to him. That was where Sam had always come in handy; even if he couldn't get them with his disarming sincerity, he knew enough medical jargon to be convincing. Which was actually hilarious, since Dean was pretty sure it all came from watching _Grey's Anatomy_ and _House, M.D._

Sam wasn't here, though, and that was the way Dean wanted it. He could do this himself.

He followed the blue arrows toward the administration wing, just as the receptionist had directed. All he'd said was that he was from the CDC, and she'd immediately told him where to go; that was a good sign that there was something here. And…there it was, on the left: Admin 303, Dr. Matthews, Head of Psychiatry. Dean knocked on the door, and momentarily wondered if it would be harder to bluff a shrink than a normal doctor.

"Come in," someone called. Dean opened the door and stepped inside.

Dr. Matthews was a balding man in his late forties whose taste in clothing—a blue-striped dress shirt and a charcoal suit—indicated a conservative personality. Even though he was sitting, Dean could see that he was thin and reasonably tall, maybe taller than he. Not as tall as Sam, though.

"Please, Dr. Danislaw, sit down," Matthews said, looking up from a paper he was furrowing his brow at just long enough to gesture at a chair on Dean's side of the antique-looking—Dean couldn't be sure—oak desk. In fact, it looked like the whole room had been furnished with pieces from the Atticus Finch Collection. Dean was just waiting for the guy to pull a gold pocket-watch out of his jacket. Or put on a monocle.

While he waited, Dean pretty quickly sized Matthews up as the kind of psychiatrist who focused on science and treatment rather than on dreams and feelings. There were no inspirational posters on his walls, and no pop-psychology books on his shelves. There was neither a TV nor a radio. God, Dean hoped it would turn out that this guy was somehow responsible for everything. Otherwise he was just boring.

Dean cleared his throat, trying to get Matthews' attention, but the doctor held up a finger.

"Just a moment, please," he said.

_Fuck you I don't have time for this_.

"'Kay," Dean answered genially. Another long silence.

"All right," Matthews said as he flipped over the last page of the document he'd been reading. "Sorry to keep you waiting, Doctor, but this information might be important to what's happening here."

"Please, call me Jack," Dean answered smarmily. He leaned in and looked at Matthews with his best approximation of Sam's sincerity. "What _is_ going on here, Dr. Matthews?"

Matthews eyed him suspiciously. Apparently Dean's best approximation was not particularly good. "Aren't you from the CDC? Didn't they tell you what was happening here?"

_Oh shit_. It took a long moment for Dean to figure out how to answer that. He barely managed to cover it.

"They told me what they know, which isn't much. I want you to tell me what you know," Dean managed, some of his nervousness leaking into his voice.

Matthews seemed satisfied with that answer. _Thank fucking God_. The older man sat back in his chair tiredly while Dean pulled out a notepad and pencil.

"That is a long story," Matthews started with a sigh. "Obviously, you know that my initial report to the CDC three months ago was based on the diagnosis of four extremely atypical cases of delusional psychosis. Since that time, we've regularly updated Atlanta with new cases."

"How many are you at now?" Dean asked carefully, hoping this wasn't something he was supposed to know.

"Twenty-eight. There have been two more since my last report a week ago. Obviously, you guys did the right thing authorizing the quarantine last night."

"So what about this psychosis?" Dean asked.

Matthews looked at him appraisingly again. "That's all in my reports, Dr. Danislaw."

"Jack," Dean reminded him. This time he'd been expecting it. "And you know these patients better than I do. If all I needed was what was in the reports, I wouldn't be here."

"Right," Matthews said, slumping down again. "It fits nearly all of the diagnostic criteria for severe paranoid schizophrenia, but as I said, it's extremely atypical."

Dean gestured for Matthews to go on.

"Firstly, there is virtually no prodromal stage. Onset is rapid and acute."

Dean wrote that down. Hopefully Sam would know what "prodromal" meant.

"Secondly, it has a relapsing/remitting symptomatic course, though like true schizophrenia, it is still degenerative. That is to say, while symptoms do not get more intense, they do come more frequently as the disease progresses."

Matthews paused and drew in another deep breath. Dean could see from the circles under the man's eyes that what was going on here was keeping him from sleep.

"Obviously, the most atypical component of this illness is that it is spreading. Psychotic disorders can't be transmitted. But the fact that the number of patients is increasing every week suggests a contagion or environmental cause. Then again, there are no disease vectors that make any sense. There are no geographical clusters, either among workplaces or among residences of the patients. There are no clear infection pathways. There is no correlation between being around someone with the disease and becoming sick. And," Matthews held up the document he'd been reading when Dean had come in, "We tested the water for everything we could think of. All negative."

Dean perked up momentarily. They hadn't tested it for everything _Dean_ could think of.

"What about treatments?" Dean probed.

"Patients respond fairly well to antipsychotic drugs. At least, they respond as well as anyone with psychosis this severe can be expected to. There are unique challenges, though. Because of the relapsing/remitting characteristic of the disease, it's hard to hit the sweet spot with the medications; the dosage has to be strong enough to prevent a psychotic break when the disease relapses but weak enough that it doesn't limit functionality when it remits," the doctor sighed. "There is, of course, no cure."

Dean scribbled all of that down. That was just about all he needed. He stood.

"Is that helpful, Doctor? Jack, I mean," Matthews asked, genuinely hopeful.

"Yes, very helpful, Dr. Matthews." Dean looked down at the desk. "We're going to need additional copies of all your files, if that's not too much trouble."

"Not at all," Matthews replied as he rose. "Just go see Jada, down the hall. I'll tell her you're coming."

"Thank you, Doctor," Dean said, extending his hand. The man grasped it firmly.

"I'm in over my head here, Jack," Matthews said sincerely. "Thank you for your help."

Dean smiled at him warmly. "It's my job."

* * *

Sam was still asleep when Dean got back to the motel room at 6:30 PM. Dean had brought back some food, but decided not to wake him. He'd give his brother every second of rest he could.

Dean draped his leather jacket across a chair, placed the files and notes on the nightstand, and sat down heavily on his bed, dropping the bag of food at his side unopened. None of this added up. Sam should not be having visionshere _at all_. There was nothing that indicated any connection to the demon that had killed their parents, and Sam's visions were always related to that.

He supposed it was possible that one of the "special children," the kids like Sam for whom the demon apparently had an awful plan, was responsible. Dean stifled a shudder at the thought. Sam was dangerously close to obsessed with the idea that he and those like him were somehow destined to become killers. If this turned out to be another example of someone like him going ape-shit…

No. There was no evidence of that. The only reason they thought that the visions had to be related to the demon was that they always had been. Some of the visions seemed pretty tangential. He'd had visions about a poltergeist in their old home, and that barely fit the pattern. Yes, the demon had murdered their mother there. And yes, their mother's spirit had still been there. But neither the poltergeist nor the new family living there had anything to do with the demon.

Maybe Sam's powers were expanding, and now he was going to start having visions about things unrelated to the demon. That was consistent with the whole 'postcognition' thing, seeing things _after_ they happened rather than just before. It also neatly explained the new intensity of the visions, and—_fuck_—it was possible that Sam was going to start experiencing his "death visions" from the perspective of the victims on a regular basis.

There weren't words to express how much Dean hated that idea.

He needed a drink, but even though it was still early and his brother was out like a light, Dean decided against going out again. He put the bag of food on the dresser—he wasn't hungry anymore—then grabbed the stack of hospital files.

He leafed through them for a few—extremely boring—hours before finally going to sleep.

* * *

Sam was standing in a field of knee-high grass under a cloudless sky. He could hear birds singing, but there were no trees.

At the center of the field was a simple stone altar, just rough-hewn blocks sitting one upon the other, but it was compelling. It drew him, despite his unease, and he found himself closing on it. He couldn't tell if he was walking towards it, or if the Earth was just moving beneath him. Einstein might say it didn't matter.

The birds stopped singing and the sky shifted, clouds rushing to cover it, their movements stuttering and starting like stop-motion photography. It became cold, and Sam realized he was barefooted and his clothes were thin and light. He hugged his arms around his chest.

He was standing over the altar now, and it was beginning to rain. The stone blocks were covered in symbols that seemed familiar but were indistinct. They looked to be marked in blood, but even had they not been, Sam felt like the very forms of the characters connoted an ancient and instinctual terror.

The blood wasn't even dry; it mixed with the rain and ran down off the blocks in tiny reddish streams. Against his fears, Sam knelt down at the altar, and after a moment he reached over to touch one of the symbols. The one that seemed important.

There was a clap of thunder and then warmth and darkness. He was surrounded by blackness, but it was not a void. He could feel something in there with him, breathing or flexing, massive in scope and horrid in demeanor. It was like it was around him, or beneath him, or behind him, but no matter where he turned there was no light and so he couldn't see it.

A flash of shining black.

A glint of mottled blood-red.

A spark of orange firelight.

The earth shook with a predatory growl and Sam could feel it closing, coming up on him from whatever direction. He ran, but in the blackness he could not judge his position, or that of the thing that was chasing him. Still he ran, in a straight line, until he crashed face-first into a rocky wall. He dropped to the ground, bruised and battered, and it was upon him.

Then he saw its awful face, and he knew that it was over.

* * *

Sam bolted upright and was out of bed in a flash. He felt his face and found no bruises or contusions. It took a few seconds before he realized it had been a dream, and a few more until he realized that his splitting headache indicated that it had been more than _just_ a dream.

"Sammy?" Dean called from behind him, wearily pulling the covers off his face.

Of course. Because there was no part of this that Sam was going to get to keep to himself. Sam took a deep breath. "I think I had another vision, Dean," he answered, turning around slowly and willing all of the fear off his face. He glanced at the clock on the dresser by the television: 5:45 AM. He'd slept for more than twelve hours. He noticed a notepad and a stack of files on the nightstand between their beds.

"What did you see?"

Sam wasn't ready for that question, if only because he wasn't really sure what the answer was yet. "What's that?" he deflected, indicating the notepad.

"What, this?" Dean held up the pad. "Notes from the hospital."

Sam wrinkled his nose and glared. "You went to the hospital without me?"

"Yeah. It went fine," Dean replied matter-of-factly. "What did you see?"

Sam looked at Dean annoyedly for a moment before coming around to the other side of his bed and sitting down to face his brother.

"It was pretty abstract. A stone altar in a field. Bloody symbols. Darkness. Something chasing me." Sam grunted, frustrated. "I feel like it was important, but I can't explain it, and I have no idea what any of it means."

"Stone altar. Like demon worship?"

"Maybe. Sorry, man. That's all I got," Sam said with a twinge of embarrassment. The feeling was becoming familiar. "These new visions are weird, man. It's like I'm actually there."

The silence that followed was almost unbearably awkward. Sam could see Dean searching for something to say, but he decided to change the subject before he could. He gestured at the files and the notes. "What'd you pick up at the hospital?"

"So, I guess we're up now?" Dean mock-complained. "Some of us didn't get fourteen hours of sleep."

Sam looked at him expectantly.

Dean stretched his arms. "It isn't just suicides. People are coming down with the crazies."

Sam took a moment to digest that. "People are going insane?"

"Yup," Dean answered, smiling ever more broadly. "And, uh. I mean I know I said it before, but…good call about this one, man."

There was a moment there—not a long one, but a distinct and important one—between Dean saying those words and Sam processing them during which Sam felt good about himself. In that moment, Dean was proud of him and letting it show, and Sam didn't see anything wrong with that. It didn't matter that it wasn't like Dean. It didn't matter that it didn't make sense. It didn't matter that Dean's eyes betrayed a worry his smile belied. Dean was proud of him, and that genuinely felt good.

In the next moment—just a second later really—reality set in, just like it always did. The out-of-character behavior, the absurdity of it, the worry in the eyes…it was all too clear. Dean was protecting him, patronizing him, propping him up like he was a discouraged child and it _hurt_. Worse than it really should have. Worse than was rational.

As he had for years, Sam came to anger first as his defense. So the next split-second was about how much he wanted to yell at Dean, to cuss him out—to absolutely fucking _take his head off_ for treating him that way. He wanted to communicate his strength and his resiliency the way that men did, the way that brothers did, the way he always had when the other man had been his father; with an energetic and determined rage.

Here was the kicker. He couldn't make it happen.

Even though he wanted to, even though he needed to, he couldn't find the fire. It startled him, and the next moment, the last moment of the few seconds of silence, was about fear. What did it mean that he wasn't angry? This was what it meant to be a man: to have the power to turn hardship into motivation, to prove, through ferocity, that you could not be conquered. After four years of college and seminars on feminist deconstructions of the culture of masculinity he was right back here and who the hell had he been kidding? It was _all_ about strength. Where was his?

"Earth to Sam," Dean teased. Sam realized he was staring at the floor and snapped back up to his brother's face. Dean looked him over carefully. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," Sam lied, because something was wrong, he just didn't know what. He didn't even feel hurt anymore, just scared, but not enough to do anything. So he just sat there, confused and impotent, and withdrew.

End Chapter 2


	4. Onset

_Thanks to Wolfschild and K. Hanna Korossy for looking over this. _

_Thanks to my reviewers, you make it worth my time. _

_Here we go; the chapter that begins the story proper. I hope that you enjoy it. _

_--Kohadril_

Chapter 3: Onset

The tiny church buzzed with noise in the warm light of the Sunday morning. So many filled the cherry pews that nearly a third were forced to kneel or crouch in the aisles. There came a knocking sound from the front of the room, and there was silence.

The preacher smiled inwardly at the crowd before him as he rapped his knuckles against the pulpit. Not since the Great Depression had sermons been delivered from this pulpit before standing room only audiences.

"You are afraid, my friends," the pastor intoned. His voice was the powerful baritone of an orator, and his subjects looked on as if spellbound. "You have reason to be."

He looked around the room, not for anything other than effect.

"It seems to me that I am seeing many of you for the first time," he said, looking down at the pulpit to pull an ancient King James from a lower shelf. "And most of the rest of you are here only for the second time, this week."

He brought the book down hard upon the yellow pine of the dais, and dozens recoiled in fright at the resounding clap.

"In sports, we speak of fair-weather fans. Those who follow their team only when they're winning. We look down upon such people." His glare was icy and hard. "You, all of you, are a bad-weather flock."

"Yes, sister. Yes, brother. I speak even of those of you who have been in here every Sunday since the day you were born. Because for the first time, you donate what you legitimately can, rather than what assuages your guilt. For the first time, you ask me for my counsel about matters of the heart, matters of moral right, even on days other than the Sabbath. This week, for the first time, you have all arrived early and will no doubt stay as late as I ask you to." He built momentum like a master, each sentence compounding judgment and shame.

"For the FIRST time, sisters and brothers, I have your FULL and UNDIVIDED ATTENTION!" he fairly shouted.

Women wept. Children trembled.

"You are afraid, my friends," he repeated. "And you have _every _reason to be."

* * *

Dean had let Sam accompany him to the public library for two reasons: first, Dean was pretty sure there wasn't anything there that could trigger a vision; second, something was wrong with Sam and Dean didn't want to leave him alone.

The younger man was sitting at the far end of the low table, almost comically hunched over, their journals and several local history texts spread out in front of him. Dean had accumulated a similar pile on his end, but he couldn't concentrate.

Sam didn't think Dean got it, but recently he had started to. He had figured out some things about dealing with Sam over the last year. He understood enough to know that he'd made a mistake this morning, when he'd tried to boost Sam's spirits with empty praise. He'd seen Sam's eyes shift, and knew Sam had noticed. He'd braced for the bitching-out he knew he'd earned, but it hadn't happened. Sam had just sat there and taken it.

So yeah, something was fucking wrong.

He'd barely said anything on the way over, and Dean hadn't wanted to push him. He knew his brother didn't like to be treated like a kid, and Dean had been doing that quite a lot lately. He figured it had been necessary with what was going on, but he also knew the dangers of going too far.

Still, Sam didn't look good. He wasn't staring into space—his focus on the research was actually pretty intense—but he wasn't saying anything, or reacting to anything. Usually when Sam found something, he couldn't tell Dean fast enough. He'd get all excited and come bounding up to Dean like a puppy with a prize, like he had the previous morning when he'd told Dean about Kidney-Dude. It was honestly pretty cute. But today he wasn't saying anything. Dean hadn't seen a change in his expression, or intensity level, or anything, over a period of several minutes. Sam hadn't even looked up; if he had, he might have noticed how closely Dean was watching him.

"Dude, are you going to help me figure this out? Or are you going to stare at me all day?" Sam asked, mildly annoyed.

_Shit._ Okay, so whatever was wrong with Sam wasn't affecting his peripheral vision. "You're the research savant. I'm too pretty for this work," Dean replied, grinning, trying to provoke a smile.

"Savant?"

"Too much?"

"No, I just didn't think you knew that word," Sam replied flatly, his eyes never leaving his work.

Dean sighed in frustration. "Look, Sam, you're writing tons of stuff down. Do you have something you'd like to share with the rest of the class?"

Sam looked up at that, and Dean saw uncertainty and disquiet. It lasted a split-second before the disaffection returned.

Sam pushed their father's leather-bound journal over to Dean, open to one page in particular. Dean kept his eyes on his brother. Sam's eyes left Dean's for a moment, and there was another split-second where he wasn't in control. Then Sam gestured at the book. Dean picked it up and grudgingly took his eyes off Sam to inspect it.

"It doesn't fit perfectly, but most of the general details are right," Sam began. "Phyraks are pseudo-demons that drive people to kill themselves. They can take all sorts of forms, but they can't actually touch or harm someone. They have limited powers of suggestion that are based on fear—the more afraid you are, the more power they have over you—and they stalk their prey for weeks before they make them kill themselves.

"So no one is going crazy, they're just being hunted by these Phyrak things," Dean concluded.

"There are a couple of inconsistencies. First, not everybody has killed themselves or even tried to." There was another momentary break; Sam was really having trouble keeping his shit together. "Second, Phyraks don't hunt together, and this is way too many crazy people for one of them."

"No, this is good, man. It explains almost everything," Dean replied, not to bolster Sam but because it genuinely made sense. "I was going to test the water, but this is way better than that."

Sam looked down again and this time it wasn't just for a second.

"It explains my visions too," Sam almost whispered. "If there's more than one, I think I can explain why."

Dean knew immediately what he was suggesting. "You think the Demon has something to do with this."

Sam nodded slowly. Dean searched for something he could say to persuade Sam he was wrong.

"Dad's journal says that these things serve powerful demons, and that sometimes a really powerful one will use them to drive people crazy so that they can be possessed easier. Which would also explain why not all of the victims have tried to kill themselves."

"No," Dean protested, not persuasively.

"It explains everything, Dean. I wouldn't be having visions if this wasn't somehow about _him_." In a flash, Sam's emotionless demeanor returned.

Dean, God help him, Dean wanted to punch his brother in the face, or yell at him, or even give him a hug, anything that would provoke some kind of serious reaction. He was just sitting there, not seething, not pacing, not even really brooding. Sam was a lot of things: sensitive, excitable, intense, _annoying_, but he wasn't cold. Not ever. He didn't deal with shit this way, by shutting down. Sam dealt with his feelings by facing them head on; Dean had only seen him fail to do so when Jessica had died. This couldn't possibly be that bad, right?

Out of the corner of his eye he noticed Sam fidgeting and heard a gasp, and that brought his attention back to his brother just in time to see him collapse to the floor.

* * *

Sam's mind screamed at him in protest—it was not meant to take this kind of strain. The images that came were fuzzy at first, an outside view of a street sign and a house, a view of a woman coming home from grocery shopping. They came out of order and were initially nonsensical. Then they started to sort and align.

He was dimly aware that his brother was holding on to him, but he was more out of it than was usual for a vision. Sam tried to speak, and hoped that Dean could hear him.

"17994 Melnore Drive." He couldn't understand Dean's response; it seemed like it was coming from miles away.

The woman set her groceries on the countertop and started to put them away. It appeared she lived alone, but she was otherwise unlike the first victim.

Another flash, and suddenly, illogically, time had skipped ahead. The light in the room had changed and the woman was tearing through her house as though chased. Sam didn't see anything following her.

She ran up the stairs—why did people run _up_ stairs?—and tried to hide in her bedroom. She locked the door and backed away, sobbing intermittently as though reacting to something Sam couldn't see or hear. She backed herself up to the bedroom window.

Finally, she broke. She shattered the window with a lamp and climbed out, cutting herself viciously on some of the remaining glass. She stumbled out onto the roof, and Sam saw it coming.

She tripped and fell, head first, onto the pavement beneath.

* * *

"God is love, friends and neighbors," quoth the pastor. "But love is not blind."

He played upon their insecurities and fears, played upon their guilt, because the faithful knew there was no forgiveness without remonstrance.

"Love is not blind and neither is the Lord," he seethed. "He has seen our wickedness, seen the evil we have let befall our town, and we have fallen from His graces.

"Could it possibly be clearer? Need you it said any louder? God is ANGRY with us! And so He punishes us with this plague of madness, which medicine can neither explain nor treat.

"I have chastised you all for your lack of faith, and let me add that I do not spare myself. Were I such a man as God asks me to be, as God has shown me how to be, you would never have strayed in the first place. But you and I…we are not the ones _most _deserving of scorn.

"Some of you here have family members who have been afflicted, and my heart goes out to you. But I do not grieve most deeply for you, or even for the stricken. For we are not the worst off.

"No, my friends. My greatest condemnation goes to those who are not _here yet_. Those who have seen God's fury and remain in their homes on His day. Those who spend their Sundays with the mewling mainstream Methodists four blocks from here, whose pretension to faith is so absurd, so utterly alien to God that they may as well be heathens or atheists.

"And it is also for them I weep, for when the Lord reaches down to heal the faithful, His hand will not linger a moment upon them. He sees the marks upon our houses, as He did in the days of old when He visited the plagues upon Egypt. Only this time it is those He touches who will be spared, and the passed-over who will suffer."

They cried and prayed, shook beneath the weight of God's Word, caught up in the awful tide of terror and penitence. The tide of God's Grace. The preacher breathed deeply, then slowly exhaled.

"God is love, but love demands respect. Love demands faith. Love demands obedience and He has yours. You have paid, and with your blood and tears you are baptized again…You are forgiven, brothers and sisters, friends and neighbors, for the sins that have brought His judgment upon us. And this, THIS you shall not doubt, even despite your imperfect faith. For He has given me the power to prove to you, to all of you in this room and to the pitiable wretches without, that His punishment _is_ His love, made manifest. For it is through His punishment that He calls us back to Him. And through His love that we shall find relief." He positively shook with his passion, and the crowd shared it, reveled in it, rejoiced in it.

"_Bring before me a man that God has stricken_!" he bellowed. "For by my hand, and by God's love, _he SHALL be HEALED!_"

* * *

There were in the car, on the way to the address Sam had picked up.

"You're saying you didn't see it."

"Yeah, I wasn't seeing the thing from her perspective this time. Apparently it was only visible to her." Sam's mind was going a mile a minute. This was a break, right? They were close to finding out what was going on.

"Wait, this doesn't make sense. I thought you said these things usually take a long time to scare their prey enough to get them to kill themselves," Dean prodded.

"No," Sam spat, suddenly angry, before he considered it and realized Dean was right. "Well, yeah. But I don't know how much time passed. It was all scattered and weird."

_Nothing else makes sense._

"Nothing else makes sense," Sam said, though he wasn't certain why.

Sam felt something brush across his neck and he swatted at it.

"You all right there, Sam?"

"Fine, just a fly or something," Sam said, scratching absently. Dean eyed him suspiciously. "It's _nothing_, all right? Keep your eyes on the road so you don't get us both killed," Sam snarled. Dean looked miffed and turned back to the road.

This thing, it was—had to be—connected to him. To the Demon. To everything. This could be it; could be the key to everything. To his visions, to his "destiny." Why the hell wasn't Dean more excited?

God, it felt like something was crawling on him.

_Look._

Something out the side window caught his eye; a field. Knee-high grass and everything.

"Dean! Stop the car," Sam demanded.

"What the fuck is it now, Sam? What is up with you?"

"Just stop the goddamn car!"

"Fine." Dean hit the brakes, hard, jerking Sam forward against the seatbelt. Sam barely noticed. He stumbled out of the car and ran into the field. Dean called after him, "Sam! What the hell are you doing?"

Sam dropped to his knees in the grass, in front of the stone altar. There was no blood on it, but still, he'd found it. The field from his dreams.

Dean walked up to him, slowly, carefully, and Sam was dimly aware that he looked worried. Sam stood and turned to his brother with a broad smile.

"Sam, what is going on here?"

"This is it, Dean! This is the field!"

"The one you dreamed about?"

Sam looked around and was suddenly less certain. There were trees. There hadn't been trees, had there? No. Or maybe…well, the altar was here at least.

"Yeah," Sam said. Whatever had been crawling on his neck was now positively fucking buried in there, so he scratched harder. Dean still looked unconvinced, so Sam gestured at the pile of stones. "This is the altar."

"Sam…" Dean said cautiously, moving in towards him. "You're bleeding."

_No._

There was a sudden flash of white-hot rage, a momentary sense that his space was being invaded. Sam tensed and chambered a punch. Dean saw it and brought his hands up defensively.

Wait…he didn't want to hit his brother. This wasn't right. The sky was wrong and the trees—maybe this wasn't the field. But the altar… And his neck was driving him crazy. He dug in deeper.

"Stop that, Sammy," Dean said quietly but not without authority. He stepped in closer, but Sam couldn't keep his mind off the stones.

_It's here. Something. It's right here. _

Sam turned back to the altar and dropped down in front of it, touching it where he'd touched it in his dream. The blood was there, he could see it, and that had to settle the question, didn't it?

Why couldn't he get this goddamn thing off his neck?

Sam felt a hand on his left wrist and…_no_! He jerked away and spun to face his attacker. His eyes found Dean's and he stopped. Dean. Right. Dean was here. His brother crouched in front of him, and there was pain there, a sorrowful earnestness.

"Come on, man," Dean said, low and stern, putting a gentler hand on Sam's side. Sam stilled, almost as if by instinct. Dean again reached for his wrist.

Dean pulled Sam's hand away from his neck and out in front of them. Sam's fingers were practically covered in blood. That was bizarre. He didn't remember getting hurt.

"How did that happen?" Sam asked blankly.

Dean looked away for a moment, and Sam heard that one uneven breath, the little hitch that always let him know that Dean was really hurting. And as Dean turned back to him, it set in. He figured out what Dean was thinking.

"No, Dean. The altar is right there. The bloody symbols…" He started to turn back toward it but Dean stopped him. Sam felt caught. Hurt and humiliated that his brother didn't believe him. And terrified that, more and more, he didn't believe himself.

"Sam, that's just a pile of rocks. There's nothing here."

Though Sam trusted himself, trusted his mind, he knew—_knew_—that his brother wouldn't lie to him about something like this. He trusted that knowledge more than his own senses. Things started to clarify, and the realization was nauseating. The trees were wrong. The blood was gone, and the rocks? They were just big pieces of basalt in the middle of a field. They weren't even arranged like an altar.

And his neck hurt. Badly.

"Dean," Sam started carefully, not sure if he really wanted to ask this question. "What's happening to me?"

* * *

Dean walked him back to the road and Sam slumped down on the pavement, back against the car. Dean grabbed the first aid kit and cleaned and bandaged Sam's neck. Sam just sat there, basically catatonic. When Dean was done, he crouched in front of his brother.

"Sam," Dean said. Sam didn't respond. "Sam, look at me."

Sam didn't turn his head, but his eyes went to Dean's.

"We're going to have to go to the hospital."

Sam looked down and nodded silently. Defeatedly.

Dean put a hand on his shoulder. Sam just sat there, staring at the ground. He didn't fight it. He didn't scream or beg. He didn't cry. Dean would have felt better if he had.

"You're going to be okay, kid," Dean said, wishing there was anything he could say that would make Sam believe it.


	5. Diagnosis

_Thanks to all my reviewers._

_Thanks to my beta for this chapter, K. Hanna Korossy._

_Sorry for the wait everyone, and I'm sorry I only had time to send this to one beta before I posted it. I'll make sure you get the next one, Wolfschild._

_Enjoy chapter 4. Happy Thanksgiving._

Chapter 4: Diagnosis

Sam sat on the hospital bed, fully dressed save for his shoes; he'd taken them off for the neurological tests and hadn't bothered to put them back on. He was slouched forward a little, staring at the wall. His brother was sitting next to him, close enough that they were almost shoulder-to-shoulder, leaving the chair by the bed unoccupied. Sam pretended he didn't notice, but he genuinely appreciated the gesture.

He'd started to feel better during the car ride to the hospital. Things were brighter, clearer, his mind sharper. He could pinpoint the exact moment his sensitivity had returned; they were just turning into the parking lot and Sam had looked over at Dean and felt—not just sensed but actually _felt_—how tense he was. His empathy, he figured, was the best way to gauge his sanity.

The doctor had left them alone about twenty minutes before, while the toxin screen was being processed. Sam had noticed some suspicious glances directed at his brother before the doctor had left. He'd thought about asking Dean about it, but he hadn't been able to find his voice. In fact, since the doctor had left neither Dean nor Sam had said a word. It was getting to both of them. Sam wondered who'd crack first.

"Feeling any better, yet?" Dean asked weakly. He didn't do well with awkward silences.

"I don't know. Are we in a hospital?" Sam replied hesitantly. Dean's eyes went wide with fear. Sam smirked back. "'Cause if we're not, I'm still hallucinating."

The shock bled off Dean's face, replaced by equal parts relief, annoyance, and humor. He punched Sam in the ribs with appreciable force.

"Ow!" Sam yelped. "What was that for?"

"That shit is not funny," Dean protested through an unwilling grin.

"I know." Sam put his hands up. "Sorry."

Dean looked at his brother with just a hint of gratitude. "It's all right. I'm glad you're feeling better."

"Yeah, I'd better enjoy it while it lasts, I guess," Sam said carefully.

Dean shot him a concerned look. "Sammy, this might not be the thing everybody else has got. It could just be something weird going on with your visions."

"Then why did I see an address that didn't exist?" Sam challenged.

At Sam's suggestion, Dean had checked whether there was a house on Melnore Street with the number Sam had seen _before_ considering whether to call it in to the police. There had been no such address, as Sam had feared. The "vision" had been a part of his psychotic break.

"I don't know. But it doesn't mean you're…" Dean trailed off.

"What, Dean?" Sam stopped for a few seconds, momentarily struggling with his composure. "Going crazy?"

Dean clenched his jaw and hung his head, looking as lost as Sam felt.

Sam felt shitty. He shouldn't have been that blunt. But he needed Dean to face the reality of this, not least because he was having trouble facing it himself. Sam was hiding from it, trying not to feel it, but this hurt in a way he couldn't have expected. In a way that struck at the very core of his self-confidence.

Dean was strong. Despite being smaller than Sam, there was never a question that Dean was the better fighter. He had incredible instincts and lightning reflexes. He was bold and decisive, a natural leader. Sam was no slouch, and he was by no means indecisive or slow, but Dean was better; maybe even better than their father had been.

But Sam was smart. He was logical, rational, and empathetic. He read people, he solved puzzles, followed the clues and figured things out. Dean had a greater practical knowledge, but lately that lead had started to narrow. Dean wasn't stupid, or bad at any of these things, but Sam was naturally better, and that was what he brought to their partnership. That was the thing he contributed.

This disease was taking that away.

If Sam couldn't trust his mind, then he wasn't useful. All he could do now was drag Dean down.

A part of him, the part of him that was a little brother, the part of him that competed with Dean and struggled to live up to him, resisted that assessment. He looked at the man next to him, catching Dean's jade green eyes, and found what he was looking for: the quiet strength he so envied and admired. Sam had tried to develop strength like that. He'd worked at it for years. He'd confused it with things like passion, discipline, and confidence, but it was none of those things, and so every time he'd thought to measure himself against Dean in that dimension he'd failed. But it always spurred him to work harder, to better himself.

It was trite, almost embarrassingly so, but it all came down to this: Dean wouldn't give up if their places were reversed.

So Sam would take whatever medication the doctor prescribed and that would give him enough useful time to help his brother get to the bottom of this. Then he'd be okay, just like Dean had said, and things would go back to normal. No problem.

* * *

Dr. Matthews returned, and his sober eyes told Dean everything he needed to know.

"The tox screen was clean. There are no traces of drugs or alcohol in your system. It's my conclusion that your symptoms were caused by a schizo-affective psychotic disorder. It is most probably the same disorder that's been spreading throughout the town for the last few months."

There it was, like a judge bringing his gavel down. Finality. Dean saw his brother duck his head. He put a gentle hand on Sam's back.

"There is no cure, but there is treatment. I'm prescribing high dose antipsychotic medications. This should slow the progress of the disease, and reduce the frequency of psychotic episodes. At least initially, most patients also notice that what episodes do occur are less complex and convincing while on the medication."

"Initially?" Sam ventured, glassy-eyed and somber-voiced. Dean was almost glad to see that this was hitting him so hard. As long as Sam could still feel, Dean knew he'd be okay.

"Yes, well, so far we haven't been able to stop the progress of the disease. Eventually you will need stronger medication. And at some point, treatment will simply cease to work."

"What happens then? When the meds stop working?"

Dr. Matthews took a moment, perhaps figuring out how to put it delicately. "The final stage of the disease is a permanent confusional state. You'll lose connection to reality and never regain it."

Sam looked like he might throw up.

"We'll stop it before it gets that far," Dean whispered, just loud enough for Sam to hear. Dr. Matthews regarded them curiously. Sam looked up at the psychiatrist.

"Thank you, Doctor," he said.

"I'll make sure you get the meds before you leave." The psychiatrist paused and turned to Dean. "And, Jack, if I could have a moment to speak with you in the hall?"

Dean looked to Sam, and Sam nodded his assent.

* * *

"Look, Jack," Dr. Matthews began the moment they were out of sight of Sam. He was furious. As well he should be. "I'm not fond of getting played for a fool. Who the hell are you, really?"

"My name is Dr. Jack Danislaw, and I'm with the CDC. Sam is my assistant. I haven't lied to you," Dean said with as much authority as he could muster.

"Bullshit," Matthews replied. "That kid is maybe old enough to have graduated from college; he sure as hell isn't old enough to be working in any significant field capacity for the CDC."

Dean didn't have an answer for that one.

"You've got about ten seconds to explain yourself before I call the police," Matthews warned.

"Fine!" Dean snapped. "He's my brother."

"Your brother?" Matthews was incredulous. "You have different last names. And he doesn't look anything like you. You need to stop lying NOW."

"I'm not lying," Dean said defeatedly. "My name is Dean Winchester. I'm not a doctor. I'm not with the CDC. Sam is my little brother."

Matthews went from livid to apoplectic.

"What?" he demanded in a harsh whisper. There was a long lull in which Dean tried to figure out something he could say or do to convince this guy not to turn them in. Eventually Matthews composed himself. "What are you doing here, and why did you want those files?"

"We're trying to figure this out. Just like you are," Dean answered. "Only we have a less…conventional approach."

"What the hell does that mean?"

All Dean had at this point was the truth, as unsettling as that was. "Do you believe in the paranormal?"

Matthews visibly balked. "Are you serious?" the doctor replied.

Dean nodded his head slowly. "Sam and I hunt things people might call supernatural," Dean said, as earnestly as he was able. He wasn't reaching the guy at all. This was going to end with prison time.

"There is no such thing as the supernatural. Nothing happens contrary to nature."

"Only contrary to our understanding of it," Sam finished.

Dean turned and saw his brother standing at the door to the examination room. He had apparently been listening to the conversation. _Good boy._

"Mr. Winchester," Matthews started, not a little flustered by the rejoinder.

"Look, you can't explain what's happening to me, or to everybody else. You can't explain why sometimes we're okay and sometimes we're not. You can't explain how the disease is being contracted. You can't even find a decent pattern," Sam argued, not letting Matthews construct a defense. Dean couldn't help but be impressed with when and how his brother could find strength. "So here's the question: why reject a potential avenue of investigation? Why not let us try to figure this out? If we can't do it, or you figure it out before us, you can still have us arrested then."

Matthews looked shocked and unsettled, but he wasn't going anywhere. "How do I know you won't skip town?" he asked cautiously.

Dean put out a hand. _I've got this one._ "Because Sam is my brother," Dean looked at Sam meaningfully, because he wasn't used to saying this in front of him. "He's my responsibility. We know some of your patients left before the quarantine, and we know they haven't gotten any better. We think whatever is doing this is here, in this town. So the only chance my bother's got to live the rest of his life without medication is for us to stay here and stop whatever's causing this."

Matthews sighed exasperatedly. Dean could see the doubts they'd planted. He could see how much the doctor needed this mystery to be solved. The man was desperate, and that was the only reason they even had a shot.

"I'm an idiot for doing this," Matthews started, almost to himself. "Fine. Cast your tea-leaves or whatever it is you do. But Sam—you _take_ those drugs I gave you. Even if this disease isn't a normal one, the treatments do help. And if things get worse, come back here and I'll get you something stronger."

"Thank you, sir," Sam said sincerely. He turned to reenter his room, and Dean moved to follow. Matthews stopped him.

"I still need to talk to you," Matthews whispered to Dean, loudly enough for Sam to hear, but not enough for him to understand. Sam's eyes went to his brother.

Dean cocked his head. "Okay," he said. "Give us a minute, Sammy?"

* * *

"Look, if you want to yell at me some more, I get it—"

"That's not what this is about," Matthews said uncomfortably. "As difficult as this is, I'm still your brother's doctor. I need to make you understand what he's going to need from you."

That got Dean's attention. "Okay," he said tentatively.

"Things are going to get worse. There may come a time when Sam will need round-the-clock institutional care…"

"No. Absolutely not."

"Mr. Winchester, I don't think you understand…"

"No," Dean said, his voice betraying no doubt or hedging. "No, you don't understand. I've taken care of him since I was four years old. And maybe I don't know a lot about schizophrenia…but Sam trusts me. He knows me,"

That was the moment Dean started to feel it again, and he quavered a little.

"He's scared. Terrified. And there is nothing you could possibly say that would convince me to leave him with strangers," Dean blinked against the unwelcome warmth in his eyes. He breathed in deeply, composing himself. "So just tell me what he needs."

Matthews watched him sympathetically. "Okay," the doctor sighed. "You're going to need to watch him, pretty much all the time. There will be times when he simply cannot control himself; you are going to need to be there when that happens."

Dean swallowed the lump in his throat and nodded. Matthews continued.

"Most schizophrenics who have to take antipsychotic medications at dosages as high as I prescribed for Sam do not like to do so. We've come pretty far in the last ten years, but these drugs are still extremely powerful and have significant side effects. What I'm saying is, you need to be the one in charge of the drugs, and you need to make damn sure that he's taking them."

Matthews paused. Dean looked up at him coolly. "Is that all?"

"Your brother is going to hallucinate again," the doctor said. "And he's going to have paranoid delusions. As I'm sure you've noticed, it's extremely disturbing to see someone you know and love act so irrationally. But he needs you to confront him. Sometimes you'll be able to convince him that what he's seeing isn't real, or what he's thinking isn't true. Sometimes you won't be. But it's extremely important that you try."

Dean couldn't deny how much that first break had rattled him, and while he now believed he was more prepared for the next one, he certainly wasn't looking forward to it. Dr. Matthews seemed to notice his disquiet, and his tone softened.

"It's possible, though unlikely, that he'll become violent. It's much more likely that he'll harm himself; for some reason this particular psychotic disorder causes suicide with a much greater frequency than normal schizophrenia."

Dean didn't even want to think about that. "Sam wouldn't—" he gulped. "Sam's strong. He wouldn't do that."

"Yes, he would," Matthews replied firmly. "A bad enough psychotic break and anybody would."

"I'll watch him," Dean said absently. At this point the conversation was almost tangential, given the thoughts running through his head. "He's not going to like it."

"For his sake you can't let that stop you."

* * *

It was late at night, but his church was filled. If anything, there were more this evening than there had been in the morning. Of course, that was to be expected; he had promised to heal a man afflicted with the spreading madness.

He was not nervous, and he did not lack conviction. These people would see a man healed, and that would solidify their faith, their subservience, to him.

His patient sat in a wheelchair next to his pulpit, so far gone that he no longer spoke aloud, and only moved in fits and starts. He was young, perhaps in his late twenties, and in good health and shape. He was the perfect symbol of the indiscriminate nature of this disease, which was why he had been chosen.

The pastor spoke not a word; he had said everything he needed to already. He raised his hands to the sky and his body shook with power. His head jerked upward and from his mouth issued the alien words of the world beyond. He was taken, as if by a spasm, and his hand jolted to the forehead of the stricken man.

From around him came whirlwinds of black smoke, up from the ground and in through the cracked windows around the church. They came up around the preacher, shifting and moving organically like a swarm of locusts. They traced the length of his outstretched arm and followed it to the younger man, pouring in through his eyes and mouth until they had wholly disappeared into his body.

The young man's eyes snapped wide open, shining midnight black.

Then they cleared, and he rose from the chair, and with the young man's smile came a joyous clamor like none the pastor had ever heard.

He had them all, heart and soul.


	6. Remission

_Thank you to my betas, Wolfschild and K. Hanna Korossy. Their work had made this chapter considerably better than it otherwise would have been._

_Thank you to every reviewer. I'm sorry I didn't get this chapter to you earlier. It's the last chapter of the first section of the story, so it's exceptionally long. I hope that makes up for the wait._

_There's some action in this one, and some angst. I hope you all enjoy chapter 5._

Chapter 5: Remission

Dean had, for the first time in God knows how long, gotten up before Sam. He'd showered, dressed, and gone out to get breakfast, fully expecting Sam would be awake when he returned.

He pushed the door of the motel room open to find that Sam was _still_ asleep, the covers pulled all the way up to his neck. It was almost 9:30, as late as he'd ever seen Sam sleep when they hadn't been out hunting the night before. Sure, Sam had to be tired, but he'd gotten fourteen hours of sleep the previous night. This had to be the drugs. The doctor had told them that tiredness would be a side effect.

_Time to wake up, Sammy._

Dean dropped the food on the nightstand and tossed the local paper he'd bought at his brother's face. Sam groaned and moved a little.

"Come on, man. You're missing the best part of the day," Dean teased.

Sam rolled onto his back and pushed himself up on his arms, the newspaper falling into his lap. He looked over at Dean confusedly. "You're up early," he mumbled groggily.

"Not really, it's 9:30."

Sam looked momentarily shocked, then Dean saw realization dawn. "Drugs. Right," he muttered, pulling himself back against the headboard and sitting up. He grabbed the paper Dean had thrown at him. "Next time could you, I don't know, wake me up a little more gently?"

"It was that or an earful of _Black Sabbath_," Dean replied with a grin.

"Never mind, then. I'll get used to the newspaper-in-the-face thing." Sam studied the headlines intently even as he spoke.

"A2, below the fold: 'Preacher Claims He Can Heal Mystery Ailment,'" Dean told him. Sam turned to the page.

"'The Reverend Harvey Bales claims to be able to heal the mysterious psychotic disorder spreading throughout Jeremiah. He says he will demonstrate his ability Sunday night at midnight…'" Sam stopped and looked up at Dean suspiciously. "That was last night. You don't think this guy can really cure people, do you?"

"Either he's lying, or he's somehow responsible for what's going on; it's just a little too convenient," Dean answered.

"So, what, do we talk to Bales or his flock first?"

"Neither. We talk to the reporter who wrote that article. My guess is she attended the 'healing' last night. I'd like to hear how it went."

* * *

They were soon on the way over to the newspaper office Sam didn't feel great, but he felt relatively normal. His mild headache and queasy stomach were either side effects of the drugs, or a product of his tiredness.

Sam stifled a yawn, and Dean noticed. He had been watching Sam intently since he'd woken up.

"You're still tired? After all that sleep?" Dean asked concernedly

"Yeah," Sam replied.

It was functionally a lie. While Sam _was_ tired, in reality, he hadn't slept much. He'd certainly slept late, and he'd blamed it on the drugs because he knew Dean would believe that, but he'd had a great deal of trouble getting to sleep. He'd stared at the ceiling for hours. He'd tried slowing his breathing, even resorting to cliché and counting sheep, so desperate had he been. The last time he remembered checking, the digital clock had read 5:15 AM. He guessed he'd gotten four hours sleep from then until his awakening by projectile newspaper.

There was no shortage of potential reasons: it could have been the stress of what was going on, the effects of the new drugs (which, bizarrely, could cause either somnolence _or_ insomnia), or the fact he'd slept fourteen hours the previous night. It could even be a symptom of his psychosis. Whatever the reason, Sam had found his thoughts impossible to chase away, and it had been a miserable night.

So he was tired. On the other hand, he was free and clear. He was aware and alert, emotionally sensitive and mentally sharp. He was in good enough shape to help, at least. He was glad Dean had brought him along, instead of letting him sleep as he had the day before.

"Listen, Sam. You don't have to say anything; I'll talk to her," Dean said as they pulled into the parking lot.

Leave it to his brother to say exactly the wrong thing at exactly the wrong time. Sam glared at Dean. "I'm fine," he said measuredly.

"Absolutely, yeah," Dean backpedaled, "I'm just saying that…given everything…I can handle this one."

Translation: _I don't trust you to not fuck up_. As much as Sam consciously knew that he was a little oversensitive about his usefulness at the moment, he was getting angrier by the second. Which was his most normal emotional reaction in the last couple of days.

"Look, if you don't want me here, or you don't need my help, why even bring me with you? Why not just go alone, like when you went to the hospital?" Sam rejoined pointedly.

Dean was silent, his features locked down tight, not displaying a hint of what he was thinking. Sam decided to tone down the intensity.

"I get it. I really do. You saw me go crazy, and now you don't trust me," Sam started. Dean looked as if he was about to protest. Sam cut him off. "But look: this thing, whatever it is, it's in the early stages. I just started medication. My head is clear and I feel fine. I can help."

_I need to help_, his pleading eyes said. Dean shifted uncomfortably.

"You brought me out here for a reason," Sam said. "Let me do my job."

Dean sat there for a long moment, looking infuriatingly conflicted.

"Fine," Dean said finally, with just a hint of a sigh. "Let's do this thing."

* * *

The reporter they were looking for was apparently not in yet. They waited for her at the reception desk, which was really not much more than a long folding table in the foyer of the old Victorian house that served as the offices of the _Jeremiah Clarion_. Dean had barely managed to flirt with the comely young receptionist; he was a little distracted.

Yeah, Dean had brought his brother with him for a reason. But it wasn't so Sam could push himself too hard trying to prove something. He'd brought him because he wasn't supposed to leave Sam alone. He'd barely managed to rationalize the five minutes it had taken him to raid the bagel bar in the motel lobby that morning. Of course, that wasn't something he could tell Sam without making things worse.

Dean wasn't mad at his brother; he was mad at himself. What a dumb shit he was. He had wanted Sam to know that he could take it easy, that Dean would pick up the slack. He hadn't even considered that it might sound an awful lot like _I don't need you_. In hindsight, it was obvious. If he'd just taken thirty seconds to think about how _he_ would have reacted to that, had their roles been reversed, he could have predicted Sam's response.

For now, he'd trust Sam. The kid had earned it.

A chubby middle-aged woman entered the room. Flat shoes and utilitarian clothing suggested a pragmatic lifestyle, and her features were strong and matronly, but she looked haggard and spent. She cursed as her purse got caught in the door and yanked it out unceremoniously. Dean shielded an inadvisable grin with his hand.

"Morning, Maggie. You're late," the secretary chided genially. "And in such a sunny mood."

"Shut it, Jeannie," the woman replied with a kind of casual hostility. She looked at the brothers, then back to the younger woman. "These your boyfriends? 'Cause the Bible says to share."

"They're all yours, Mags. Jason Kent and Derrick Johnson from the _World Herald_. They want to talk about Bales."

The older woman looked Dean in the eye and went quiet for a moment. "How'd you guys get here from Omaha?"

Sam jumped on it without hesitation. "We were here before the quarantine. We've got a contact at the CDC who said there might be a story in Jeremiah. So the _WH _sent us out here. We got trapped. We read your story about Bales, and we want to know more."

The woman eyed Sam skeptically. "What are you, twelve?"

"Twenty-five," Sam lied. "And I know that's young. They don't exactly send the A-squad to backwater shit-holes like this one."

There was a long, pregnant pause, and Dean thought for sure Sam had fucked up. Then the woman erupted in laughter. She put out her hand.

"Anyone that honest is a friend of mine. Margaret Olds, senior reporter and news editor for the _Clarion_."

Sam stood and took her hand. "Jason Kent."

Dean remained seated, but waved his hand nonchalantly. "Derrick Johnson."

"You want to blow the lid off that jackass, am I right?" Olds inquired conspiratorially.

Sam nodded comfortably. He was in his element. Once again Dean kicked himself for doubting him.

"It's not going to be easy," the woman sighed. Dean detected cigarette smoke, tomato juice, and a little gin on her breath. He liked her already. "Well, come on back to my office. The coffee's shitty, but it's free."

* * *

"So," Sam said, piling into the car next to his brother. "Demon possession."

"Looks like," Dean replied. "Pretty bold to do it in front of hundreds of people. He's probably a demon himself."

"Yeah," Sam agreed pensively. "He says he'll 'heal' someone else tonight."

Dean pulled the car out of the spot and navigated them back to the main thoroughfare. Sam sat there thoughtfully.

"It doesn't feel right."

"What?" Dean asked.

"Demon or not, I don't think Bales is the one causing the disease."

"Why not? You said yourself, demons sometimes use those phyrak things to drive people crazy and make 'em easy to possess."

"Not every patient hallucinated about scary monsters, Dean." Sam's tone was quiet, almost sullen. "I didn't."

"They're shapeshifters. They can take a lot of forms."

"But they always appear as creatures hunting people. They don't turn into fake altars for demon-worship. It's not their M.O."

There was silence, and Sam saw Dean working through it in his head, trying to make things fit.

"So Pastor Evil found another way to make people crazy. I don't buy that this is a coincidence," Dean argued.

"Yeah," Sam acquiesced.

The blocks rolled by, and there was a comfortable silence. Comfortable for Sam, at least. Dean was working his jaw a little, and fidgeting. That was how he got when he was about to say something uncomfortable. Sam knew exactly what it was.

"Look, Sammy—"

"I know, Dean," Sam interrupted him. "And I'm sorry for overreacting."

"Right. Good. Okay," Dean sputtered.

Sam grinned to himself.

* * *

The arsenal was strewn across their beds, and Dean was carefully disassembling, cleaning, and reassembling every single weapon in the lot. Sam was sitting at the window table searching their journals for something that would help them.

Sam felt a little foggy, and was having considerable difficulty concentrating. Once again, the diagnosis was a toss-up between tiredness and the meds.

"What's up, Sam?" Dean asked, breaking the silence. "You've been staring at that page for like fifteen minutes."

Sam decided that ignoring the question was the best way to proceed. "I don't think we're going to find anything better than exorcism, Dean."

Dean sized his brother up. Sam tried to look focused. "There's at least one, probably two, and maybe more of them. I can see us trapping and exorcising one, but if there's more, the others aren't just going to stand around and let us do it."

"So we trap them all and exorcise them one by one," Sam replied, aware of how ridiculous that sounded, but unable to think of anything better.

"That's either one big circle or a bunch of stupid demons," Dean retorted. Sam looked at his brother frustratedly, but didn't argue. Dean was right that the idea sucked. "Maybe we should try out Dad's theory."

Sam raised his eyebrows and gaped with incredulity. The theory Dean was referring to was mentioned in their father's journal, that a demon could be forced out of a human body if enough damage was done to the host that the demon could no longer hold the body together.

Dean noticed Sam's dismay. "What, you don't think it'll work?"

"No, Dean, I'm sure it will work. But we'll need a whole lot of explosives, and it'll be pretty hard to maintain a low profile if we're chucking grenades inside a church," Sam protested. "Plus, it'll kill the hosts. Innocent people, Dean."

"Maybe, Sammy, but your idea will get _us_ killed. We won't do anybody any good if we're dead," Dean said coldly, as though that was the end of the discussion. It made Sam furious when Dean acted paternal like that.

"Blowing these guys apart doesn't send the demons back to hell. It just leaves them without a body. And with the number of crazy people in this town, it'll only be a few days before they've found new hosts," Sam shot back heatedly.

"Which is enough time to figure out what's causing the craziness, assuming it doesn't stop when we force the demons out of their hosts. Once people aren't crazy anymore, the demons won't find any easy victims," Dean raised his voice just a little, and fixed his eyes on Sam's. Sam did his best to manage his anger.

"Look, Dean. This is crazy. What are we going to do? Put bombs in their cars? We're not terrorists! What about bystanders? Family members? You blow enough stuff up and there's going to be some collateral damage."

Sam saw a kernel of doubt in his brother's eyes. "Fine. Two shitty ideas. There's got to be something else."

"What if…" Sam started, trying to put his thoughts together. "What if we just go after the one we know is a demon? We get him when he's away from the church, exorcise him, then crash Bales' next healing with the crazy guy with us. It'll prove he's not healing anybody. Turn his flock against him."

"How would that help?" Dean asked, suspicious but intrigued.

"Some demons feed on the belief people have in them. That's why there are demon cults. If Bales is one of those, then the more followers he has, and the more faith they have in him, the more powerful he gets," Sam suggested. "Right now he's probably way too powerful to take down. But once he's revealed as a fraud, he'll get really weak, really quick."

"Sounds like a plan," Dean agreed. "What do we do with him then?"

"If he's weak enough, blessed weapons might kill him. Or we could at least bind and exorcise him," Sam concluded.

"In front of all those people?"

"I know it's weird, but it's our best idea so far."

"Good call," Dean said, pulling the slide on the gunmetal M1911 back into position. It released with a satisfying click. "So where do we find him?"

* * *

Jeremy Halstadt, the man they knew to be possessed, was single, which was almost incredibly lucky. Moreover, he lived in the only apartment building in the city, and neither of the apartments adjacent to his was occupied. Sam and Dean didn't have to worry so much about being quiet.

Sam felt a little uneasy as they mounted the steps to the second floor. It was just nerves, he told himself.

They made their way down the hallway, dim due to poor lighting and the time of day; it was just after 10:00 PM. They'd spent quite a lot of time preparing for this encounter. Dean was almost at Halstadt's door. Sam tensed as he crept up toward Dean, feeling like something was watching him. He noticed some movement at the edge of his vision and his heart jumped. He spun to face it.

Nothing.

"Sam!" Dean whispered harshly. "Let's go, you pussy!"

Sam glared at him and then joined him at the door. Dean pulled a heavy sheet from his bag and unfolded it carefully. It had a circular hole in it, around which were the carefully drawn wards of the Devil's Trap. He bundled it up for quick deployment, then put three fingers up.

"Three," Dean whispered, then counted down silently on his hand, pressing himself up against the wall beside the door. When he reached "one," Sam knocked on the hollow-sounding door. A few seconds of silence elapsed.

"Who is it?" came a voice from within the room. Dean moved as if to break down the door, but Sam waved him off.

"My name's Jason Kent. I'm from the _Omaha World Herald_. We heard that Reverend Bales healed you of the psychotic disorder that's been spreading through town," Sam tried. His entreaty was met with silence. "We'd really like to talk to you."

They heard footsteps approach the door, the handle jiggled, and the door popped open just a crack.

That was all Dean needed. He burst through the door and threw the sheet over the man before him. Sam was right behind.

The demon cried out as it threw Dean around the room. Dean clung on tight, getting a grip around the thing's waist from behind. It bucked against him, but still he held despite getting tossed around like a rag doll.

Sam grabbed at the sheet, pulling it down over the creature. He'd almost gotten it aligned properly when a flailing hand found his chest and sent him flying backwards into a bookcase. His back impacted painfully against one of the shelves. He stumbled and dropped heavily to the ground.

Dean finally got the thing around the neck and pulled its head and shoulders through the hole in the sheet. Its struggles ceased almost immediately as the binding runes took effect.

"You okay, Sam?" Dean asked as Sam rolled over onto his back.

"No permanent damage," Sam groaned, taking a moment to lie there.

"I will kill you both!" the demon screamed. Dean turned back to the trapped demon, its youthful face contorted with hate. Behind him, Sam climbed to his feet.

"Sammy, did you hear that?" Dean chortled, pulling the sheet even and flat around the demon's feet. "Demon says he's going to kill us."

"Maybe he means when he finally gets _back_ from hell," Sam suggested. "'Course, that'll be like two centuries from now."

The demon shook with rage, throwing itself against the walls of its invisible prison.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, there, Black Eyes. Fighting isn't going to help you," Dean coaxed condescendingly. "The only thing that might is telling us what's making the people in this town go crazy."

"How would that help me?" the demon breathed, low and menacing.

"Sam?" Dean asked cheerfully.

Sam pulled a plastic water bottle out of his bag. He handed it to Dean, who proceeded to wet his fingers with the liquid inside. He flicked some on their prisoner. It sizzled and burned as it made contact with the demon's skin, and the thing screamed in pain.

"How's that holy water feel?" Dean taunted. "Either way, you're going back to hell. The question is: how do you want to spend the next twenty minutes?"

"I don't know!" the demon yelled desperately. "I truly don't know!"

Dean looked taken aback. "Sammy? Get the book."

"You believe him?" Sam asked, genuinely curious. He shuffled through the bag to find their book of exorcism rites.

"Not sure." Dean carefully filled the cap of the bottle with holy water, and held it threateningly out in front of him. He looked right into the demon's eyes. "Is Bales a demon?"

"…Yes," the demon whispered fearfully.

"What's his true name?" Sam asked, coming up alongside his brother, holding the tattered ritual book.

"I don't—"

"Wrong answer." Dean flung the capful of holy water in the demon's face, and it screamed horribly.

"I don't know his true name! But he calls himself Aphorael!" the demon yelled, panting and trembling with pain.

"He's probably telling the truth. No demon would be stupid enough to trust another with his true name," Sam whispered. Dean nodded, but kept his eyes fixed on the demon.

"Is he the one making people crazy?" Dean demanded, raising his voice. Sam could practically feel his brother's anger, and it was a little scary.

"No," the demon started quietly, almost apologetically. Dean fingered the bottle and the prisoner quickly continued. "But he knows what is. He didn't tell me what it was, but it's why he came here."

Dean looked at Sam. Sam nodded.

"Okay, Sammy. Make with the exorcism."

* * *

Sam sat there, in the back seat of the Impala, trying to keep the newly demon-free Jeremy Halstadt calm. It wasn't as hard as one might expect, given how far along his symptoms were. He didn't speak, at least not coherently, and he barely reacted to anything around him.

Halstadt was bound, his hands behind his back, but at this point that wasn't really necessary. He wasn't very big, perhaps 5'9" and 150 lbs, and he wouldn't have been a match for either Sam or Dean even if his brain did work.

He was perhaps Dean's age, clean-cut and good-looking. He was fit and strong despite his size, as Sam had found trying to wrestle him into his seat.

He was smart, too. After the exorcism, they'd searched Halstadt's apartment and discovered that he was a second-year surgical resident at the local hospital. Or at least, he had been before he'd gone insane.

Looking at him now made Sam sick to his stomach. Halstadt just sat there, curled up against the door, nodding absently. He whispered and mumbled gibberish.

Halstadt suddenly moaned deeply. It was an angry sound, and the man started to strain his seatbelt, trying to get it off of him as though it were causing him pain. Sam put a hand on the invalid's shoulder and tried to push him back down. Halstadt bleated an incoherent protest.

"Can you settle him down back there, Sammy?" Dean asked, pulling over to the side of the road.

"I'm trying," Sam replied, pulling off his seatbelt so he could use both hands. He pulled off Halstadt's seatbelt and the man seemed to still a little. It was only for a second. Sam could see his triceps flexing underneath his tee-shirt as he tried to free his hands. When he wasn't successful, he screamed again.

"Seriously, you need me to come back there?" Dean asked.

"No," Sam said. "Gimme the wire cutters. He doesn't like being restrained."

Dean sighed deeply, but did as he was told. "You'd better keep him under control."

Sam cut the plastic tie holding Halstadt's hands behind him. The man immediately lashed out, lunging at Sam's chest.

"Sam!" Dean yelled, throwing the door open and getting out of the car.

Sam subdued the man with some difficulty, pinning him to car door with considerable force and holding his arms at his sides. They were face-to-face, and for just a few seconds the man seemed like he was there with him. Not rational by any stretch of the imagination, but at least aware of Sam and what was going on. In that moment, Sam saw his terror. And he could practically feel the man's sense of unbearable loss. _That_ was what awaited him.

He couldn't handle it.

Dean had made his way around the car, and he opened the door against which Sam had Halstadt pinned. The man was calmer now, arms hugged across his chest, completely unresponsive as before. Dean was able to jostle him into his seat without much effort.

Sam was barely able to wait that long before he fled the car.

"What the hell, Sam?" Dean called.

Sam ignored him, running as far as he could before his reflexes took over. He fell to his knees just off the road, doubled over, and threw up.

* * *

"Sammy?" Fuck. It was 11:30. The exorcism had taken longer than they'd thought it would, and they didn't have time for this. Dean slammed the door and sprinted to Sam's side, ignoring Halstadt completely. It wasn't like the guy had anywhere to go.

He dropped to one knee next to Sam, and tried to put a hand on his shoulder. Sam jerked away.

"Get off of me!" he growled, shoving Dean hard enough to knock him on his ass. Oh. So it was going to be that way. They _definitely_ did not have time for _this_. Sam tried to scramble to his feet, but Dean caught his leg between his own and twisted, bringing him down face first. Sam writhed around and grabbed Dean around the midsection, forcing him against the pavement.

Sam was fighting hard, but not particularly smart. Dean trapped Sam's arm against his chest, snaked his left leg over Sam's right thigh and rolled them over, achieving the full mount position. He struggled to get hold of Sam's arms.

"Sam, if we had the time, I'd let you work this out yourself, but we don't!" Dean yelled, pinning Sam's hands to the ground above his head. "So let it out! Deal with it! Fuck your pride!"

Sam squirmed to find some position where he could hide his face. He failed. He looked at Dean furiously, struggling and desperate to push his brother off of him, and Dean knew exactly why; there was only so long that Sam could keep down his fear, hide his vulnerability, and the kid didn't want him to see it when he couldn't anymore. Dean felt sickeningly guilty, not just because he was short-circuiting Sam's ability to deal, but because he had let his brother sit back there with Halstadt. There was a difference between knowing that something was going to happen to you, and seeing exactly what it would look like when it did. Sam had handled the first pretty well. The second…not so well.

For just a moment, Dean let his attention slip. Sam took advantage of his distraction to get a foot up against his brother's chest. He kicked, throwing Dean hard onto his back. Sam was on him again in a flash, connecting with a huge right-cross to the temple that made everything go blurry. When Dean's vision cleared, he saw Sam above him, his fist held high. Dean put up his hands defensively, but the blow never descended.

Sam was trembling mightily, tears in his eyes. He wheezed and tried to get disentangled, desperate to escape, but Dean quickly sat up and grabbed him around his chest. Sam struggled against him, but he was weaker now, unable to fight, and eventually he just gave up.

After a few more seconds of fighting back tears, he finally gave that up too. He buried his face in his brother's shoulder and cried.

"You're not going to end up like him, Sam," Dean whispered as his brother sobbed in his arms.

It was a few minutes before Sam had calmed enough for Dean to pull away. He held Sam at arm's length and looked him in the eyes.

"We've got a job to do," Dean said, for once knowing exactly what to say. "And I need your help. Are you up to it?"

Dean saw a trace of doubt cross Sam's eyes, but it quickly disappeared. "Yeah," Sam managed painfully.

Dean smacked him on the side of the head. "Good. Put your game face on. It's time to show these people who that self-righteous bastard really is."

* * *

He was disturbed that his servant had not yet arrived, but he could wait no longer.

"As you saw me heal Jeremy Halstadt, so shall you see me heal another tonight!" he called from the pulpit, gesturing at the woman sitting next to him. "This lovely young woman, Rebecca Wright, is afflicted with a disease our own sins have brought down upon her."

The crowd gasped, and the reverend calmed them with a gesture.

"But your penitence does not go unrewarded. For as your faith grows, God empowers me to do more, to heal more. Tonight I shall heal one, but tomorrow it shall be two!"

The crowd began to murmur excitedly.

"The day after, it shall be three!" He shouted. "And then?"

"Four!" the crowd cried back, wholly in his thrall.

"Before long, my friends, no man or woman shall fear this disease. All God needs is our faith, and the more you can convince to come to this church, to listen to God's word, the faster he'll allow me to heal all those who have been stricken!"

The crowd exulted.

"Like you healed this man?" came a voice from the back of the church. A tall man in a ski mask stood there, holding Jeremy Halstadt next to him. The man trembled violently, clearly insane. The demon within him had been exorcised.

The crowd went deathly silent, and, for a brief moment, Aphorael felt fear.

* * *

"Fool!" the preacher yelled, his eyes glistening black. He put up his hand, and an unseen force took hold of Sam, slamming him into the back wall.

The crowd saw the preacher's naked hate, saw the depth of his evil, but it wasn't working fast enough.

"Come on, Dean," Sam whispered to himself as the force began to compress his ribcage. He couldn't breathe.

A loud crack rang out, and a hole appeared in the preacher's head. It was not a small one, but it began to close up unnaturally. Dean came up behind the pulpit, and drew his wicked blessed machete.

"He's a demon!" Dean yelled. "God doesn't give gifts like that!"

The crowd was screaming now, fleeing from the room in a panic. It was pandemonium, even as the demon held his concentration on Sam. Sam could feel the force holding him weakening gradually, but not nearly fast enough.

He blacked out.

* * *

Dean stalked up to his enemy and shoved the machete directly into the preacher's chest.

It sizzled as it entered him, and the demon screamed, dropping the hand reaching toward Sam and striking Dean across the jaw, knocking him off the dais. He landed awkwardly, twisting his right leg as he tried to avoid falling face-first into the first row of pews. He heard his knee pop and his leg buckled under him. He yelped in pain as he dropped to the ground.

The crowd was running for their lives. Across the room Sam dropped to the floor, out cold.

Aphorael struggled to pull the machete out of him, but he was weakening by the minute. Dean rolled into a prone position and pulled out his M1911, shooting the demon three more times.

The demon finally got the blade free of his body. It threw the machete at Dean, who dodged it easily. Dean struggled to his feet and fired again, and Aphorael staggered backward.

It was looking for the back door. Dean could see the demon's indecision, vacillating between rage and fear.

Finally, the preacher made his choice. He flung his hand out at Dean, using all his remaining power to toss him to the floor with considerable force. By the time Dean got back to his feet, the demon was gone.

Dean momentarily considered going after him, then remembered Sam. He jogged down the now-empty sanctuary to where his brother lay, limping heavily and grunting as he did. He dropped to his knees with a grimace and pulled Sam's mask off before removing his own. He put a hand on Sam's chest and felt it rise; he was breathing.

Dean allowed himself a moment of relief. He clapped his hand against Sam's cheek, not hard enough to be very painful, but enough to reflect the situation's urgency.

"Hey, little brother. Wake up. The police are gonna be here any minute."

Sam groaned and coughed. It took him a moment to focus his eyes.

"You okay, Sammy?"

"Chest hurts," Sam gasped dazedly. He breathed some more, in and out, and Dean watched him carefully. After another moment Sam smiled weakly. "Next time you're the distraction."

"Why?" Dean asked, smirking condescendingly as the worry left his face. "You're so good at it."

Sam ignored his brother, often the best policy. "Did you get him?"

"No, but nobody here is going to believe anything he says from now on," Dean replied. Sam moved as if to sit up, and Dean leaned back to give him room.

Sam sat up carefully, rubbing his chest lightly and wincing. His eyes fell on Halstadt, who was gibbering mindlessly in the aisle. Rebecca Wright was similarly catatonic up on the stage.

"They're still crazy," Sam said, voice heavy with disappointment. "This isn't over."


	7. Voices

_Sorry this took so long, everybody. I had no end of writer's block with this one. I had virtually no time constraints this week, so if I'd been productive, I'd have cranked out three or four chapter and gotten ahead, but the writing gods are fickle, and denied me that opportunity._

_Thanks to everyone who has reviewed so far. I'm glad to be entertaining so many people._

_Thanks especially to my beta, K. Hanna Korossy. Her comments on this chapter helped it immensely, and I'm extremely glad to have her helping me out. _

_So here it is: the first chapter of the second part of _Disorder_. I hope you enjoy it. _

Chapter 6: Voices

Sam wasn't sleeping. He lay there, staring at the faux-stucco ceiling, waiting for exhaustion to take him, but it wasn't happening. In the three days since the confrontation with the demon, he'd gotten maybe four hours of sleep altogether. He hadn't had insomnia this bad since…well, since Jessica had died.

When he did sleep, he was plagued with bizarre nightmares, and though they felt like visions, extracting their own physical costs in the form of a headache and tiredness, they were abstract to the point of incomprehensibility; fire, death, vicious-toothed jaws, evil symbols writ in blood portending an unfathomable doom. Thoughts of those dreams haunted him day and night, his mind instinctually trying to interpret or unravel them and failing.

He wasn't talking to Dean about it, though sometimes he wanted to. He was careful to make sure Dean didn't notice how little sleep he was getting, and he had gotten good at staying quiet and in bed upon waking from a nightmare. When Dean asked him what was wrong, he didn't just dismiss the question, he actively misled him, admitting to insecurities he didn't really have so Dean would think he was being honest. The rationalization was simple: Dean wouldn't let him help if he knew what was really going on, but part of him knew that wasn't the real reason.

God, he was a fucking coward.

Sam turned on his side and shut his eyes again, trying to will himself to sleep. He lay perfectly still, and some time later—it was hard to tell how long—he finally felt himself drifting away.

"_You're selfish,_" came John Winchester's voice from the foot of his bed, feeling for all the world like judgment.

Sam sat bolt upright, mouth open in voiceless protest, but he found no one to whom he could respond.

_Oh no._

"_Selfish and weak,_" his father said again, the voice coming from behind him, or possibly above him, neither of which was possible.

Sam's heart jumped and his throat tightened. He looked frantically around the room, hoping against hope there was some way this wasn't what he knew it to be. A hidden microphone? A ghost or spirit? Nothing. He barely stopped himself from getting out of bed and searching the room inch by inch, and only managed because he knew it would wake his brother.

"_We protected you, loved you, and you abandoned us,_" the voice accused.

Sam couldn't help but feel it. It was like getting punched in the stomach; it knocked the wind out of him and left a kind of dull nausea. He couldn't let it go unanswered.

"No," Sam mouthed weakly. He hugged his arms across his chest and leaned back against the headboard, staring evasively at the ceiling.

"_Yes! And it was because of your pride. You weren't as good as Dean at anything useful for hunting. You didn't really want a normal life; you just didn't want to be a sidekick._"

Sam grunted, swallowing heavily and trying to keep it together. Dean stirred in the other bed, and Sam's eyes shot to him. Fearful. Hopeful.

Sam forced himself to still. But when Dean settled, when his light snoring resumed, he felt no relief. In fact, he felt isolated and alone, even more vulnerable than before. He stared achingly at Dean's sleeping face, turned toward him and illuminated by the blue glow of the digital clock, and realized that he needed him right now, no matter what the cost to his pride. He was about to call for him when:

"_As usual. Turn to Dean for help when you can't deal. All you ever do is take._"

Sam physically winced, the shame like an iron spike through his gut. Dean's name died in his mouth.

"_You're a parasite, Sam. You're like a fucking vampire. And one of these days Dean's gonna run out of blood._"

"It's not real. It's not real. It's not real," Sam whispered to himself, sliding back down the headboard and onto his side, resting his ear against his pillow and curling up. He folded the pillow over his other ear, practically burying his head, as though that might muffle his father's voice.

"_You can't hide from the truth, Sammy,_" his father said, as if from inches away. "_And the truth is, he'd be better off without you._"

Sam barely kept in the sob, whimpering quietly into his pillow instead. He curled up tighter and helplessly waited for it to stop.

----------

Dean awoke to the trying-way-too-hard rock-and-roll theme music of the local news station. It was not a pleasant reveille.

"Turn that shit down, Sam?" Dean entreated dazedly, pulling the covers up over his head. He didn't get an answer. "Sam?"

"Yuh," Sam garbled as he popped his head out the bathroom door, toothbrush sticking out of his mouth. "Gibbe min't."

"That's okay," Dean replied, blindly reaching over for the nightstand and feeling for the remote. He fumbled and found it, but only after knocking his keys and one of their journals to the ground. "I got it."

He fingered the button to reduce the volume and glanced at the set.

"According to Dr. Matthews at James Rhodes Memorial Hospital, there have been more new diagnoses of the unexplained psychotic disorder in the last three days than in the two weeks prior. Seven new cases in all…" the coiffured newscaster exposited.

"Sammy, you hear this?" Dean called. He heard Sam spit into the sink.

"Yeah," the younger man said. He came out into the main room and sat down on the foot of his bed. Dean waited for him to show some kind of emotional response, but Sam just watched intently as though it were fascinating in an academic way but not particularly relevant.

"What do you think?" Dean probed, hoping to elicit something.

"I don't know, man."

Dean sighed and dropped his head back against the headboard. "You wanna go get some breakfast?"

"Already did," Sam answered. He got up, grabbed the bag next to the TV, and tossed it onto Dean's lap. "Bagels."

A little wave of discomfort shot through Dean's stomach when he realized that his younger brother had left the room alone, however briefly. But Sam _had_ been all right for the last few days. Dean figured he was probably being irrational.

"Coffee?" Dean asked hopefully.

"On the dresser. I grabbed like a ton of sugar. I know how you like it," Sam replied, almost cheerfully.

Dean regarded his younger brother curiously. "You're awfully chipper this morning."

"Got a pretty good night's sleep," Sam said, stretching his arms back and breathing in deeply, showing off his disturbingly large wingspan. "I feel great."

"I'm glad, man," Dean said hesitantly. As much as he wanted it to be true—wanted Sam to really be feeling this good—this seemed a little over-the-top. But Sam wouldn't lie to him. "Sam…you'd tell me," he started, a little embarrassed to ask. "If something was wrong, right?"

Sam looked at him blankly for a moment, then nodded his head emphatically. "Yeah. Of course."

Dean watched Sam for a minute, and the kid didn't crack. Maybe he genuinely felt as good as he said he did.

"Okay," Dean said. He tossed off the bedcovers and swung his legs over the side with a grimace. His knee was still swollen, and he massaged it gently.

"You need an icepack?" Sam asked, already on his feet and moving to get it.

"No. That's all right," Dean said. "Just toss me that knee-thingy."

Sam picked the nylon sleeve up off the floor next to his feet and passed it to his brother. "You shouldn't leave that lying around."

"I'll try not to, _Mom_," Dean snarked. He waited for the rejoinder, but Sam seemed to have lost interest. He was busy picking up the stuff Dean had knocked to the floor when he'd been flailing around for the remote. Dean snorted and wondered why his brother was suddenly such a neat freak.

Whatever. Bigger stuff to deal with.

"Okay. So the way I see it, we've got three options," Dean started, watching as Sam proceeded to pick up and fold his bedclothes and put them in a drawer. "One, we can keep chasing the demon, even though the trail's gone cold."

Sam just kept shuffling around, putting things in order. This was getting annoying.

"Hey, man! You listening?"

"Yeah," Sam said, a little too quickly. He noticed what he was doing and Dean's frustrated expression, and immediately stopped. He parked himself on the foot of his bed, then looked up at his brother intently. "Sorry."

Dean shook his head confusedly. "Anyway. Option two: we call Ellen and see what she knows about the area, 'cause we've got nothing in our journals and there's not much at that library."

Sam just kept staring up at him, more attentive than Dean ever remembered him being. It was actually kind of unsettling.

"Three, we can go talk to the shrink again. The thing's spreading faster…maybe there's a pattern now. So, what do you think?"

Sam shook his head. "I don't know. Whatever you want to do."

Whoever the hell he was talking to wasn't his brother. "You seriously don't have an opinion?"

"Nope."

Dean rolled his eyes exasperatedly. "Fine. We're calling Ellen."

----------

"James Washington? Hold on, let me get a pen," Dean said, searching the dresser for a writing implement. Sam fished one out of his pocket and handed it to him with a genial look. Dean glanced at him uncomfortably. "Thanks, Sammy."

Dean grabbed the little pad of paper the motel left by the phone and jotted down the address. Sam just stood there next to him, not seeming to know quite what to do with himself. This close, Dean couldn't help but notice the faint bags under Sam's eyes. For whatever reason, Sam rarely showed any physical signs when he wasn't sleeping. So as insignificant as it looked, it was something.

"No, nothing's wrong. Yeah, we'll be careful. We'll call you when we're done here." Dean pressed the button and ended the call, holstering his cell in his right front pocket.

"What'd she say?" Sam asked a little too eagerly.

"As close as you were standing, I'm surprised you didn't hear," Dean teased, intentionally trying to provoke a response. Sam smiled good-naturedly, which was not what Dean was looking for. "There's a militia-type guy who lives out in the woods. James Washington. He's a hunter. Apparently, he and Dad knew each other. Ellen says the guy's a little crazy, but she has no idea why he's not in Dad's journal."

That, right there, was an opening for Sam to say something about their father having had a falling out with every human being he met. It was a kind of bait Sam had never shown the ability to resist. Until now. His smile faded, but he didn't say anything. That was quite enough for Dean.

"All right, that's it. What the hell is up with you?" Dean snapped.

"What?" Sam asked, innocent-faced.

"You brought me breakfast and coffee. You can't stop cleaning up our shit." Dean was counting the items on his fingers, his voice getting louder as his little rant went on. "You're not arguing with me, you're not whining, and you're not making snide remarks about Dad's social skills. So I repeat: What is up with you?"

"Yeah. I can see why you're so upset," Sam said sarcastically. "Is any of that bad?"

"No," Dean fumbled. "Not…really. But it's pretty freaking weird!"

Sam shrugged appeasingly.

"I don't know what to tell you, Dean. I'm fine. Really." He came right up to Dean, put a hand on his shoulder, and grinned. "If it'll make you more comfortable, I'll try to insult you more."

Dean gave him a conciliatory half-smirk and wondered whether _he _was the one going crazy.

----------

They were in the car, some 70's hard rock that Sam couldn't identify blasting out of the Impala's formidable stereo. Sam felt ragged and weary, as much from deceiving his brother as from what was actually happening to him. But he couldn't bring Dean in now; he'd given his brother enough shit for a lifetime, and he didn't want to make things any worse.

"_It won't work._"

Sam stifled a grimace as the voice returned. He pretended to ignore it, hoping that would make it go away. He rationally understood that the voice—which had kept him up all night, switching off between his father, Dean, and Jess—did not exist independent of him. But he couldn't help but personify it, think of it as some kind of tormentor that was just following him around. In a twisted way, that was more comforting.

"_You can't change who you are._" It was Dean's voice now, which was all the weirder for the fact that his brother was beside him, driving the car.

He bit his lip and turned to look out the window, unsure that he could maintain his composure under this kind of attack. He hardened his resolve, let some anger in, and focused.

It was bullshit anyway. He wasn't trying to change who he was. Maybe he was laying off the bitching, and maybe he was trying not to be such a burden; that didn't have anything to do with his condition. They both needed a break, and Sam was trying to do his part to let up on Dean.

"_You just keep telling yourself that._"

He wanted to yell at it to shut up, but that wouldn't exactly have been inconspicuous. Sam kept his tongue and forced himself to think about the job, about what they were going to do once they talked to this Washington character. He had already learned that he couldn't tune it out, but at least he could deny it importance.

"Fascinating view?"

It took a moment for Sam to realize that the voice was actually his brother's, and he almost jumped out of his seat. His eyes shot from the window to his brother.

"A little on edge, Sammy?"

"I guess, yeah," Sam mumbled.

Dean sighed and glanced at his brother seriously. "Sam, you've been acting weird. Not crazy weird, but weird. If something's up with you, I need to know about it _before_ we go talk to the crazy militia gun nut."

"_I need to know if you're going to fuck this up and get us shot,_" the voice taunted.

Keeping his cool, keeping those feelings off his face was one of the hardest things Sam had ever done, but it worked. Dean didn't appear to notice anything amiss, and Sam was staring right at him. He had never been able to bluff his older brother, and some part of him, some small but vocal part of him, wished he wasn't so good at it now.

"I'm a little stressed, Dean," Sam said, putting just enough pain into his voice to convince his brother this was the admission he was looking for. "I can't stop thinking about Halstadt…about what happened to him. About what's happening to me. It's like a black cloud that's just following me around."

Dean glanced over again, and Sam saw sympathy, which suggested his brother was buying it. Sam looked down sullenly, partly to play up his "admission," and partly because he was having trouble looking Dean in the eye. He felt Dean punch him in the shoulder lightly.

"I'm trying to put on a brave face for you, man. Sorry I'm not handling this better," Sam said, the only truly honest thing he'd said to his brother all day.

"You're handling it fine. I'd be freaking out too." Dean gave him a reassuring half-smile, seemingly convinced. Sam felt a little sick. Dean looked him over one last time. "You okay to work?"

Sam nodded, unable to make himself speak.

"_Even if you could get him to forgive you, it would just make it harder on him,_" came Jess's voice. "_When you finally do what you need to do._"

----------

Aphorael was running, through farmland and forests, though he wasn't sure from what. It moved in the shadows, just outside of his sight, quick and sure and desperately hungry.

It certainly wasn't those accursed hunters, though they had hounded him incessantly for a few days after their encounter. No, whatever this was, it wasn't human. And it was like no demon he had ever encountered.

The reverend's broken body was slowing him down. He had tried to leave it—his powers were too weak to completely heal it—so that he could take another host from among the insane, but something was keeping him where he was. Probably the same thing that was chasing him.

The stress on the host was causing the damage to get worse. If he didn't rest soon, the host would die and he'd be trapped inside a corpse. But he was in the middle of the forest, and there was too much cover—too much opportunity for his assailant to come upon him unawares.

Aphorael glanced to his right by chance and saw a broad, low hill with a flat top on which no trees grew. It was perhaps half a mile a way…it was bizarre that he could see that far through foliage this dense, but there almost seemed to be a corridor in the trees. He gasped painfully at the thought of making the run, but he saw no other options.

He ran hard and long, heaving and grunting with nearly every step. He tasted blood in the back of his throat and wondered if this was what it felt like to die. When he crested the hill he found himself in knee-high yellow grass. He turned and looked around; the hill was just high enough that the tops of the trees growing at its base could not be seen from the summit.

He forged on toward the center of the field, where he saw a break in the grass; a flat area of hard-packed dirt, devoid of vegetation. When he came upon it, he found a rocky outcropping and collapsed against it, exhausted.

For perhaps a minute Aphorael caught his breath, channeling what little energy he had into healing some of his wounds. He adjusted his collar; his black robes were in tatters, but he hadn't the heart to abandon them. They reminded him of what he'd lost, and what he now had to find a way to survive long enough to avenge.

When he felt strong enough he stood and looked around. When he turned to look at the rocks against which he had been resting, a shock went through his body. They were stacked upon each other, not jutting out of the ground; this was a ceremonial altar. And it was truly ancient.

He backed away from it, utterly confused and not a little frightened, but when he turned to run, his path was blocked.

A young man stood there, tall and thin and menacingly calm, a hint of a smile on his lips. The demon stopped dead, dumbstruck, sapped entirely of his will to flee.

The man advanced on him, and as he did Aphorael stood frozen, transfixed by his terrible black eyes. They were not empty like a demon's; they were like the sky on a clear night, filled with tiny lights and constellations. As he watched them, the lights swirled and danced, enacting epic pageants of the births and deaths of galaxies, hinting at the awful secrets buried in the sod of distance and time.

Aphorael ripped his gaze away and fell to his knees, trembling…and crying. The man crouched in front of him and brought his mouth up close to the demon's ear.

"It has been so long. You have all forgotten," the man whispered. "Nothing lasts forever."


	8. Delusions

_I've got an awesome new job that I'll be starting here pretty soon, so I need to get this story done as soon as I can. To that end, here is Chapter 7, ahead of schedule. Chapter 8 should be up in the next few days, and Chapter 9 (the last chapter of section 2) a few days after that. _

_Thank you to everyone who has reviewed this story; I hope you're all enjoying where this is going._

_Thank you to my beta K. Hanna Korossy, who knows better than any of you that the natural state of my punctuation leaves much to be desired. _

_Enjoy Chapter 7,_

_Kohadril_

Chapter 7: Delusional

The car was a mile and a half behind them, parked just out of sight of where the road was gated. They were making their way up what was little more than a wide dirt trail, and Dean wondered how anyplace this far afield even had an address.

It was fairly plain that Sam was hiding something from him. His acting had been pretty good; Dean had almost believed that his brother was just stressed. The kid was a skilled liar—they both were, as their father had been—and he knew exactly what to say and how to say it. But Sam was not good at lying to _Dean_.

It wasn't that Dean had some kind of preternatural ability to read him, though that was probably what Sam believed. He just always gave himself away, eventually, when he lied to his big brother. In the car, earlier that day, there had been a moment near the end of the conversation when Sam had broken eye contact. He'd covered well, but not well enough, and Dean had known immediately there was more than he was being told.

He wasn't really sure how to handle this. It had been a while since Sam worked this hard to keep him in the dark about anything. Since just after Jess had died, in fact, when he'd hidden that he'd had precognitive dreams about it. Dean hadn't really ever figured out how to handle that, but the situation had resolved itself: Sam had eventually told him of his own volition.

This was different. Sam was sick, and Dean needed to know how sick so he could keep him safe. Part of him wanted to _make_ Sam tell him what was going on, beat the truth out of him if need be, but he couldn't make himself do it.

Independence was important to Sam, and at the moment he had almost none. They were always together, and since his illness, Dean had been watching him more closely than usual. At this point, there wasn't much in Sam's life that Dean wasn't a part of, and Sam clearly wanted to keep his monopoly on whatever he was hiding. As much as Sam's independence had hurt him in the past, Dean didn't want to take away what little the kid still had.

All of that would be moot if Sam were really in trouble. Though if he were, Dean wanted to believe Sam would come to him on his own. Dean called him a kid, but he was actually an adult; a full-grown man who had the right to decide how to deal with his own issues. But the _moment_ Dean saw something that suggested Sam wasn't able to do the job, he was going to make him talk.

There was another reason he was reticent. Dean would never say it, and he didn't like to think about it, but this was working him over pretty badly. Doing this job was hard enough without having to watch Sam every minute of the day, without having to make sure he took his medicine, without having to worry about every odd expression and out-of-character mannerism. By not telling him about this, Sam was trying to lighten the weight on his shoulders. Dean wouldn't have let him, but the load really was heavy.

He hated thinking about shit like this, but they were hiking through the middle of nowhere, and Sam wasn't being particularly conversational. And humming Zeppelin wasn't soothing Dean at _all_.

He didn't know what to make of this job. Their trip to Washington's compound seemed like a really easy way to risk their necks for nothing, but ever since they'd taken down Aphorael, it had been one frustration after another. There weren't a lot of other options, and neither of them knew how long they had before Sam started hearing voices and seeing things again, or how long those things would be controllable before he went crazy, or how long after _that_ until he was completely consumed.

So, yeah, there were things Sam wasn't telling him. But there were things he wasn't telling Sam. Like how those moments Sam had been hallucinating, out in that random farmer's field, had been some of the scariest of Dean's life. Or how absolutely fucking terrified he was that he was going to fail, and that his brother would pay for it with his sanity.

They were coming up on some kind of heavy-duty perimeter fencing, and Dean was glad for something to distract him from his introspection. He looked up to see some pretty nasty-looking barbed wire on a plane jutting outward from the top of the fence. They might risk that wire going the other direction, but it was impassable from this side. The gate was heavily reinforced, and the padlock holding it closed looked like it was designed to take a handgun shot.

"Saw that coming," Dean groused. Fuck. They had to see this guy, but they didn't have his phone number, and they weren't about to wait for him to come out and find them. He looked at Sam, and they shared a frustrated look. "Start looking for a weak spot in the fence, 'cause we're gonna have to cut our way in."

* * *

The stranger stood and looked into the sky. He was clad in heavy garments, jeans and layered clothes that looked made for work, and the demon knew he had seen them somewhere before. Yes! The night those hunters had come after him, the first to enter had been wearing clothes like these. Though he had been masked, this man had the same build and height.

Aphorael knew for a fact that this hunter was not immune to his powers; he threw his hand out, diverting all his energy into a telekinetic blast.

His target, wholly unaffected, turned back to him, eyes shifting to a natural grey-green. "I am not the man whose form I have taken, and you have no power over me."

"Who are you?" the demon breathed.

The stranger stopped for a moment, his tight smile growing just slightly wider. "The dream of a dead god."

"What do you want from me?" Aphorael asked tremulously.

"I have not taken this form by chance," the man said conspiratorially. "I took it to show you the face of a man I wish destroyed."

Aphorael felt some of his fear fade. He had some leverage now.

"I do not have the power to fight those hunters, not so long as you keep me in this body," the demon said.

"You will stay in that body, since I cannot follow you if you flee. But I _will_ give you the power to complete your mission."

The demon looked at his new master quizzically, assessing whether anything he had just learned represented an exploitable weakness. "Why can you not kill him yourself?"

"I am trying."

* * *

They had made it through the fence, but they'd had to find a place where they could slide in under it; the mesh had proved far too tough for the small wire cutters they'd brought with them. This had taken them about a half a mile around the side of the compound, leaving them quite a distance to cover. Sam was not having an easy time of it.

"_Just admit it. The world would be a better place if you'd never been born._" The voice was still Jessica's, and Sam was beginning to have trouble keeping his cool.

He stopped for a moment, letting Dean get a few yards ahead of him. Sam turned from the path and just stopped for a moment, resting his head against a large spruce tree and closing his eyes. He tried to concentrate on what was around him, the things he could hear, smell, feel: the reality that wasn't in his head. For a moment he heard nothing, and thought he'd done it.

"_Dean would still have his mother and his father,_" Jessica accused. Sam's frustration spiked, and his hands balled into fists. "_My parents would still have a daughter._"

"Damn it!" Sam yelled, punching the tree without thinking. He gasped and drew his hand back, cradling his damaged fingers.

"Sam?" Dean called, and Sam could hear him hurrying back through the undergrowth.

"I'm fine," Sam called back, just as his brother came into view. Dean came right up to him, a suspicious look on his face. "I tripped," Sam tried.

"What happened to your hand?" Dean asked, reaching for Sam's arm. Sam nearly pulled away, then realized that would look suspicious. He let Dean inspect his injury.

"Bashed it into the tree when I fell," he gritted as Dean looked it over. The older hunter lightly squeezed an area just between Sam's battered first and second knuckles, and Sam yelped in pain.

"You didn't fall. You punched the tree. Hard enough to bruise your hand," Dean said, a hint of disappointment in his eyes. "What, did it say something about our mom?" he joked humorlessly.

"I didn't—"

"Don't lie to me!" Dean snapped.

It was all unraveling. Sam tried to come up with something Dean would believe, but he didn't have any time. He did his best to keep the panic from his face.

"What's going on, Sam?" Dean asked again, this time with quiet insistence.

"_Don't tell him anything._" It was John Winchester again, stern and forceful.

Sam tried to keep his mouth shut, but he couldn't stand the way that Dean was looking at him: angry, worried, and unapologetically affectionate. He had to tell him.

There was a rustling sound in the foliage just ahead of them, interrupting the conversation. Dean immediately put up his finger, pulling the .45 out of his waistband. Sam drew his Beretta. Dean signaled for him to take the right, and Sam complied.

"Freeze," came a calm, gravelly voice. A rifle barrel appeared from out of the bushes beside Sam. Sam looked to his right and saw an older man with steady hands holding it. As Dean turned to help his brother, another man emerged behind him.

"Hands on your heads, down on your knees," the older man said, without any particular anger. The brothers did as they were told. "What are you, reporters? Cops?"

"No," Dean said. "We're looking for James Washington. We're hunters. He knew our dad."

"I'm James Washington." The grey-haired, square-jawed man looked thoughtful for a moment. "You're John Winchester's kids?"

"Yeah," Dean said.

"Well, he must be dead then," Washington concluded. "Because he would never have been dumb enough to send you here."

* * *

They had been brought to a building at the center of the compound that looked a lot like an old mission house. There were crosses everywhere. Dean was seated next to his brother on a low bench facing a long table; this looked to be the militia's dining hall. Washington glowered at them from the other side of the table, and two of his lackeys stood at the door, cradling rifles.

"Well? What is it? What did you come here for?" Washington challenged.

Sam wasn't moving, and he wasn't talking. His head was hanging, his eyes distant. He looked like something indefinable had been kicked out of him. Dean was alone on this one.

"I told you. We're here about what's happening in town. The whole 'plague of insanity' thing?" It was a moment before Dean realized he should probably rein in the sarcasm.

Washington stared at him, unblinking. There wasn't a hint of acknowledgement.

"You do _know_ that the whole town is going crazy," Dean pressed. "Right?"

The grey-haired man nodded slowly. "Yes, we know."

"O…kay," Dean mumbled confusedly. What the hell was up with this guy? "So, do you know what's causing it?"

"Yep," Washington answered with a smug grin.

"And…what is it?" Dean prodded.

"Boys, do you know why your dad and I didn't get along?"

"No. Does it have anything to do with whatever evil S.O.B. is making everybody crazy?" _Just get to the goddamn point!_

"John Winchester was a good man," Washington said seriously. "But he lacked vision."

"Fine. Yes. Vision. Whatever. What the hell kind of monster is it?"

"You shut your mouth, boy, or I'll have you put against a wall and shot!" Washington snapped, suddenly fiercely angry. "You and your brother."

Dean dutifully shut up.

"As I was saying, your dad didn't see what was really going on here. All these demons, all these evil things, they can only hurt us because of the godless era in which we live. That's what lets them into the world: our sins. And our government, our culture, our entire way of life supports those sins." Washington's eyes were wild with passion. "You want to stop the demons? Destroy that culture, and rebuild it from the ground up."

Realization started to dawn. "You're doing this somehow," Dean said, low and cold. He looked over at his brother and tried to keep himself under control.

"Have you ever heard of the Anasazi?" Washington asked. "They were a Native American civilization indigenous to what is now the Four Corners region of America. Their history spanned two thousand years. Then, suddenly, they all disappeared."

Dean glared at him, and Washington looked pleased.

"Jeremiah is built on what used to be their farthest northeastern outpost. I know what ended their civilization, what the final few of them managed to trap here, deep within the earth." The madness in Washington's voice was palpable. "It is a being of pure chaos, a product of our great subconscious fears. It is the bringer of catastrophic change, a fire to cleanse the world, that we may start anew. Once, long ago, it destroyed the Anasazi. And now that I have broken the spell of its ancient captors, it rises again."

"You bastard!" Dean exploded. The guards at the door immediately trained their guns on him. "What's happening to all these people, to my brother…all those suicides; it's all your fucking fault!"

"Your brother?" Washington glanced over at Sam, who was silently watching the exchange though his mind appeared to be somewhere else. Washington looked back at Dean, his expression now having shifted to what seemed to be genuine remorse. "I'm sorry."

"Right," Dean spat.

"I _am_. Many of my people have been taken by the disease. My wife among them," Washington admitted painfully. "We put them out of their misery. They are heroes and martyrs, as is your brother."

"A martyr gets to choose," Dean growled, shifting in his seat. The only thing he wanted in the world right now was to leap across the table and tear out Washington's jugular.

"You're lucky he's not a psychic," Washington said solemnly. The brothers' eyes snapped to one another. "It makes their powers go crazy."

"I don't suppose you're going to tell us where it's buried, or how to kill it?" Dean guessed.

"No. And I'm afraid there is no cure for your brother but death."

"I'm right here," Sam said softly. Everyone's attention immediately shifted to him. "You can stop talking about me like I'm not."

Washington sized him up. There was a twisted kind of sympathy in his eyes. "If neither of you has the strength…I can end your life for you, Sam."

"No," Dean said immediately. Sam gulped and shook his head.

"Fine, then." Washington looked back to Dean. "You're going to leave this town, and not come back until after this thing has risen. By then, you won't have any power to stop it."

Dean just kept glaring.

"You're dead if I see you again. Do I make myself clear?" Washington threatened. Dean forced himself to nod. "Then my men will take you back to your car."


	9. Psychotic Break

_The patient and talented K. Hanna Korossy has helped immensely with all the chapters she's betad, but this one more than most. She looked over, and made multiple fantastic suggestions, to two separate drafts of this. This makes her awesome, and somebody who deserves your thanks (if you enjoy this chapter, that is). _

_Thank you to all of my reviewers; I'm glad so many people are interested in where this is going._

_I hope you enjoy Chapter 8, which is unusually long. This is the angst climax of the story. If you like breakdowns, this is the one you've been waiting for._

_Kohadril_

Chapter 8: Psychotic Break

The ride back to the motel was long and silent, and as much as Dean knew he should be forcing Sam to talk, it was so much harder now.

They'd spoken, briefly, early in the trip. Just enough to ascertain they were on the same page with respect to Washington's threat. The guy rarely left his compound and had no idea where they were staying, so they didn't feel he was dangerous.

Dean hit the brakes at a stop sign as they came into the downtown area, and a sharp pain lanced through his still-swollen knee. It wasn't much—he didn't even grimace—but for a moment he appreciated how damaged his body was, all the injuries he'd never gotten checked out. All the dull, persistent pains he'd routinely ignored. He was a walking bruise; he ached from head to toe, but he kept it all from Sam. Why?

There were things Dean knew about his brother, things their father had told him just before he'd died, that Dean had promised not to tell Sam. When he'd made that promise, he hadn't realized how much the knowledge would weigh. Like the injuries, they were a burden he bore alone, that he couldn't ask for help with, that split him away from his brother.

He could handle that, though, and he had been. He could even handle doing the job at the same time. Dean recognized, without self-congratulation, that he was stronger than most. But even with all these things he could do, with all this strength he had, he couldn't handle _this_. He couldn't take care of his schizophrenic brother on top of fighting demons, militia nuts, and the mother of all nightmares. It was just too much—one crisis too many.

So he wasn't making Sam talk to him. Because whatever Sam was hiding, whatever burden he wasn't sharing, Dean couldn't take it right now. Something was wrong with Sam, and a large part of Dean _didn't want to know what it was_. It was shameful, horrible, gut-wrenching, but it was the truth.

And it wasn't a choice, or at least, it didn't feel like one. As much as Dean knew exactly what was going on inside his own head, it didn't seem like he had any conscious say in the matter. He kept trying to talk. He'd open his mouth to say something, and Sam would look at him almost hopefully, and Dean would…just shut down. Involuntarily. Like he'd been kicked so often and so hard that he couldn't muster the courage to put himself out there again.

If he'd been any less disciplined, in the least bit weaker, he'd have been bawling at the side of the road. As it was, he kept his mouth shut, and they sat, mired in guilty silence.

When they arrived in the parking lot, it was near bedtime and Dean was relieved. He was exhausted, Sam was exhausted, and things usually looked better in the light of day than in the dead of night. Just a few hours of rest, just one goddamn night of weakness, and Dean knew for certain that he'd have the strength to make Sam talk in the morning. Maybe Sammy'd even have the strength to tell him the truth, and there would be a few less secrets dividing them.

* * *

Sam stood in the field again, in his bedclothes, beneath an orange sky. He had come to know this place so well, he recognized every difference: it was sunrise rather than midday, there was a warm breeze rather than a cold wind, the grass was dry and prickly underfoot, and the ground was hard rather than wet and spongy.

There were no clouds to be seen, even as he approached the altar. He still had no control; he couldn't stop himself from moving toward it. All these variations in atmosphere and environment, but the progression was always the same.

He was there now, at the altar, and the earth beneath his feet was growing warmer, vibrating perceptibly and issuing a deep, low hum. The stone table was practically covered with blood, he now noticed; the ancient scripts and characters were painted over. Blood ran off the stones in rivers rather than streams, mixing with the dirt under Sam's feet, even as the hum began to crescendo.

The vibration built to tremors, which built to shaking, which built to an earthquake. The stones collapsed, and the earth split beneath Sam's feet and suddenly he was falling, fast and far, landing with bone-crushing force on a rocky floor as the ground closed up above him, leaving him in darkness.

He struggled to raise his head, and he caught a brief glimpse of a grinning, knife-toothed maw as his consciousness slipped away.

* * *

Sam awakened with a shiver, his head throbbing. His whole body was cold, a fine layer of sweat gluing his pajamas to his chest and legs. The moment of terror quickly subsided, the power of the imagery and visceral sensation fading almost immediately upon waking. He thought, for what had to be the fiftieth time in the last few days, that these dreams, these _visions_, would not be nearly so awful if he had a fucking clue what they meant.

Of course, that was asking too much, wasn't it? He'd heard what Washington had said: just like everything else, this was a symptom of what was going on. That his powers were "going crazy" was a product of the evil stirring beneath the earth.

Sam slid out of bed quietly; in the dark, stealth was a reflex. He grabbed a dry shirt from his bag and made his way to the bathroom, turning the lights on only once the door was closed and locked behind him. He sat down carefully on the toilet lid and pulled off his damp shirt, resting there for a moment and collecting himself.

He needed this to stop. He needed to be able to sleep through the night so he could have his wits during the day. The visions sucked. They always had. But he could _handle_ them. Sam could handle losing the woman he had intended to marry, losing his father, helping Dean cope, and doing this job. He didn't imagine, would never imagine, that he was as strong as his brother was, but he wasn't weak, and as awful as dealing with all this stuff had been, he'd survived.

_This_ was too much, this disease. It was just one thing too many. He was overwhelmed, constantly carrying with him a primal sense of panic. He wanted to scream, wanted to cry, but he knew his brother would hear it, and Sam wasn't stupid. He knew Dean was carrying much too much already.

He'd been so close to giving it up, to telling Dean everything, before Washington had interrupted them. He still wanted to, but he couldn't make the first move. He was paralyzed by his pride, by his fear, and by these thoughts he had, these awful thoughts that somewhere, deep inside, Dean resented him.

Their father had basically sold Dean's childhood to pay for Sam's. As good as Dean was at all the things John Winchester seemed to value, in retrospect, Sam understood that his brother had never really been given a choice. He couldn't leave the family because it was his job to keep his brother safe. It was ingrained in who Dean was, to the point that there was a gun by the sink right now, a Smith & Wesson autoloader and a full magazine, next to Dean's toothbrush where he'd left it to dry after cleaning it that morning.

And Sam had repaid that by abandoning him. By questioning his every action and plan. By holding him back and criticizing him. By being a constant burden, an extra consideration, a complication to Dean's already difficult life. How the fuck could Dean _not _resent him?

He breathed deep, clenched his jaw, willed the moisture out of his eyes and stood to face the mirror. He fought himself, fought his feelings, until the man looking back at him betrayed no weakness.

He reached for the dry shirt, and something caught his attention. His mirror image stayed perfectly still. When he turned back to it, he found a pair of obsidian eyes. Sam barely kept in a shout as his heart practically jumped out of his chest.

"_See it,_" Jessica said.

"_See what you're becoming,_" John Winchester commanded.

"_See what you are,_" his brother whispered.

"No," Sam said aloud, backing away from his demonic reflection, which was now matching his every move.

"Yes," came John's voice from beside him. Despite himself, Sam spun to face the sound and, horribly, found the form of his father standing exactly there. But it wasn't his father, for in the place of that man's dark green eyes was the horrid swirling yellow of the demon that had killed everyone—save for Dean—that Sam had ever loved.

Sam's hand shot out and snatched the autoloader from the towel by the sink, shoving the clip into the handle and drawing back the slide to ready the first round in a single flash of motion. He put the gun right at the demon's head.

"You know I'm not here," the demon said. "And even if I were, that popgun wouldn't do a damn thing to me."

"So I'm hallucinating?" Sam searched.

"No," the demon twisted. "But you did know that I'd start coming to you, didn't you? Like I came to Anson Weems? I'm here for _you_ now, Sammy."

Sam's stomach clenched, a sick feeling overtaking him. He fell back heavily onto the toilet lid, gun held limply at his side. "I'll never do anything for you."

"Yes, you will," the demon said, morphing into Dean before his eyes. As Sam watched, one, two, three huge bullet holes appeared in Dean's body, two in the heart, one in the center of the head. "You'll do this for me."

The surge of guilt was awful, a vicious wave of nausea and self-loathing ripping through his body. Sam restrained a silent cry, and even more narrowly kept from throwing up. He looked away, the tears coming freely now.

"No," he protested weakly when he finally got some control over himself.

The demon leaned down in front of him, his shirt and face practically covered with the blood streaming from the gaping wounds. "And after that, you'll do so much more. My army needs a leader, Sammy, and that's you. My favorite son."

"What?" Sam gasped.

"What, John didn't tell you?" The demon's snideness while in Dean's body was horrifically appropriate. "Actually, that's not so surprising, since you're not actually his son."

There was no feeling more akin to horror that Sam had ever felt than the one that kept him silent and attentive as the demon revealed the awful truth.

"That's right, Sammy. I'm your daddy."

"No," Sam whimpered again, without the barest thread of conviction.

"God, he must have really hated you, to keep the truth from you like that. And Dean? Dean probably knows, too. He probably hates you just as much as John did, but can't admit it to himself, 'cause he's a good brother." The demon looked at Sam with a malicious smirk. "Well, half-brother, anyway."

Sam couldn't bring himself to move or speak, so he listened, trembling with guilt, fear, and grief. It was true, Sam could feel it within him. Every word the demon spoke was laden with confirmation of fears Sam had long held.

"But there's nothing good about you, is there? All that's stopping you from accepting your destiny are your childish notions of loyalty and family. Dean is all that's left, and you don't owe him anything. Once you realize that," the demon needled, "you'll do exactly what I want you to."

_I owe him everything_, Sam thought after another agonized glance at his brother's mangled form. The world clarified and he finally understood that no good could come of his life. He was a burden to a brother who justifiably resented him. His existence had brought nothing but violence and pain to those he loved. And he was the spawn of a demon, whose influence would inevitably twist him toward horrific evil. It became absolutely apparent what he had to do.

"No," Sam said a final time as his tears stopped and determination took hold. "I won't."

The demon looked on fearfully as Sam brought the barrel of the gun up to his own temple.

* * *

Sam wasn't in his bed, and Dean could have sworn he heard him talking to someone in the bathroom. He was up at the door, and Sam had just denied…something. It was difficult to make out.

"Sam? Open the door," Dean called, a horrible feeling in his stomach. "Whatever you're seeing or hearing, it isn't real."

"Go away," Sam croaked, clearly crying.

"I can't do that, man. Not until I know what's going on," Dean replied. There was an ominous pause.

"I'm sorry, Dean. I'm so sorry," Sam said, his voice heavy with remorse and finality.

"Sam? Sam!" Dean yelled. He'd left a gun in the bathroom, with a full clip of ammunition. "Whatever you're thinking, I forgive you! Just don't—"

Fuck this.

Dean backed up two feet from the door and gave it a powerful kick, easily busting it open. Sam was sitting on the toilet in his pajama bottoms, gun pressed into his right temple, staring up at Dean with weakening grit. Dean suppressed the urge to rush over to him and pull the gun out of his hands: such a move might force his brother's hand.

"I need to do this," Sam said, maybe as much to convince himself as Dean. "I can't…hurt people anymore. I don't want to be a demon."

"You won't be, Sammy," Dean said, voice trembling with fear even as he tried to be soothing. It was difficult to concentrate on keeping an even tone when all he could think about was the gun at his brother's head. He inched closer to Sam.

"He was here! The demon!" Sam yelled, anger flashing in his eyes. He regripped the pistol, and Dean's heart nearly stopped. "He told me everything. That I was his son, not Dad's. That you know it, too. So stop pretending!"

"It's not true," Dean sputtered. "None of it. Do you hear me? It wasn't real!"

Sam looked down, anger bleeding into confusion and pain again. Dean leaned toward his brother and held his hand out in front of him.

"Give me the gun, Sam," he pleaded painfully. Sam paused, considering it.

"No," he wheezed, pushing the barrel into his head even harder. "No, I've got to do this."

"Why?" Dean tried, inching even closer.

"All I ever do is hurt you," Sam choked. "And I'm going to do it again. The thing I'm becoming…I'll hurt you. I've seen it." He fought off a sob, but only barely. "You've done everything for me. I owe you my life—I can't hurt you anymore."

Sam's index finger went to the trigger.

"Sam!" Dean shouted desperately, ignorant of the tears running down his cheeks, heedless of his faltering voice. "Sam, what you're about to do? Nothing you could ever do would hurt me worse."

Sam's eyes shot to Dean's, and Dean saw real conflict. "Bullshit. I know you resent me. I know I deserve it."

"A little," Dean admitted. This was not the time for lies. "We're brothers and that's how it goes. But I care about you, man." Dean found himself shielding his eyes from Sam, as though how deeply he cared for his brother was something to be ashamed of. And there again was guilt. What was Sam supposed to think, if this was the way he acted? He stared Sam right in the eye, and said the thing they never said. "I love you."

Sam whimpered and looked away, clearly overcome. There was a tense moment, another hint of conflict, then his finger moved away from the trigger, his grip on the gun loosening.

Dean moved in, slowly, deliberately. He crouched in front of his brother and put his left hand gently on the gun. Sam tightened momentarily, and Dean resisted the impulse to try to pull the gun away.

"No," Sam bleated. "I need to…"

"No, you don't," Dean said, putting his free hand firmly on Sam's bare shoulder. Sam stilled, then relinquished the gun. Dean laid it carefully on the ground, overwhelmed with relief and that awful, crushing feeling of narrowly avoided tragedy. He pulled Sam down against him as the younger man dissolved into uncontrollable tears.

"I'm sorry, Dean," Sam wept into his brother's shirt. "I'm sorry."

Dean choked on a sob of his own and clung fiercely to his brother. He buried his face in Sam's hair and kissed his head, praying for the strength not to let him down again.

* * *

A half-hour later, Sam's psychosis had remitted. He was sitting at the foot of his bed, fully clothed—socks, tee-shirt, hooded sweatshirt—but he still felt unbearably naked. Dean was at the foot of the other bed, staring at the ground.

"What was it?" Dean asked quietly.

"For a while, it's been voices," Sam replied softly. "Tonight I saw…my face, in the mirror, with black eyes. Then I saw the yellow-eyed demon in Dad's body."

Sam heard Dean grunt. It was an agonized sound, like a choked, hysterical laugh.

"How long?" Dean asked, louder this time, turning his head to look at Sam. Sam could see tears shining in his brother's eyes. "With the voices, how long?"

"Just since last night."

"There's more, then, right?" Dean pushed, gritting his teeth. "I know you haven't been sleeping."

"Dreams," Sam answered honestly. "Like the one I hallucinated about. The altar in the field."

Dean looked down and took a deep breath. Sam fully expected he was about to get yelled at. He was almost looking forward to it—he knew it was deserved.

"I fucked up, man," Dean said soberly. "I knew you were hurting and I didn't make you tell me why."

"What?" Sam balked, almost angrily. "This isn't _your_ fault. I made my choice. I'm in control of…" he trailed off as the absurdity of the statement became apparent to him. That brought a familiar tightness to his throat.

"Yeah," Dean mused. "That's what I'm saying."

"I can still…" Sam fought, trying to find something he could still do for Dean, some utility he still had that the disease hadn't taken away. He failed. "God," he whispered.

"We're going to have to change some things," Dean said, all business. And in a moment of clarity, Sam knew exactly what needed to be changed.

"Take me to the hospital," he said, interrupting his brother.

"What?"

"Commit me, Dean," Sam said defeatedly.

"Wha—No!" Dean's eyes went from forced calm to pure terror in a split-second.

"That's what's left, man," Sam said, cold and rational. "All I can do now is get in the way."

"I'm not leaving you with people I don't know!" Dean got up off the bed and faced Sam. Sam stood, too, putting every inch of his considerable height to use as he looked down at his older brother.

"Then I'll do it myself," he said brokenly. He couldn't believe how much this hurt, and he couldn't imagine why Dean was putting up so much of a fight against it.

"No. Fuck that. No," Dean said, moving right up to Sam, not the least bit intimidated. "You're not going anywhere."

"I'm an adult, Dean!" Sam yelled. "I don't need your permission."

Dean just stood there, lost and afraid, and Sam turned away to find his duffel bag.

"No, I guess you don't," Dean's voice came from behind him, low and uneven. "You sure didn't care what I thought the last time you left."

Sam grimaced as though struck, and anger flashed in his heart. "Holy shit, you do not get to use that now."

"Why the hell not? The only difference between then and now is that I'm not letting you go."

"The only difference? What? How about that I'm not safe to be around? How's that for a difference?" Sam turned back to Dean. "I could hallucinate that you're a shapeshifter and put one in your head when you're not looking."

"You remember that last hunt we had, before you left? The werewolf that nearly broke you in two?" Dean interrogated. "I do. I got that thing's attention off you and it ripped me up pretty bad. I still have some of those scars, and I remember the way you looked at me after. Like you were responsible for it."

"That's not why I left!" Sam protested a little too hard.

"It was part of it," Dean hit back. "You always think you know what's best, but you don't get it. I took the hit, and I'll always take the hit, because I'd rather be hurt than see you hurt. So if you're going to leave, don't fucking pretend you're doing it for me."

Sam felt like he'd been slapped. There was so much pain in Dean's voice that it hardly sounded like his brother at all. "I'm not leaving you forever. Just until you find the thing and kill it."

"I can't do that without you," Dean said.

"Yes, you can. You just don't want to."

"No," Dean reaffirmed, looking at Sam with real, unguarded tears. "I can't. You need me to say it out loud? Fine! You're smarter than me!"

Sam was struck dumb.

"When we're dealing with werewolves or ghosts or something fucking normal, maybe I know more than you, but we're not!" Dean continued, betraying an insecurity, a flawed humanity, Sam rarely ever saw. "I don't know what to do. I don't know how to find it or how to kill it, and no book out there is going to tell me. I'm not smart enough…" Dean swallowed heavily and wiped his nose with his sleeve. "I'm not smart enough to figure this out on my own. But you're smart, Sammy. Scary smart, sometimes. Even if you're crazy half the time, you've still got more of a shot than me. And our chances are even better together."

Sam resisted it, largely because he didn't think it was true. He didn't believe he'd be useful at all, didn't think he had anything left to give. But it was clear Dean believed he did. That hurt, too, because Sam couldn't stand to let his brother down.

Worse than that fear, though, was the one of being too much of a burden for Dean to handle, of getting him killed if he stayed. Sam only had one card left to play.

"I almost killed myself tonight," he reminded Dean, prompting a grimace from his brother. "I'm not safe here."

"And you're safer in the loony bin? What happens if you have a vision? Or start babbling about what we do?"

"They'll just think I'm hallucinating."

"What about Washington? He hears you're at the hospital, he'll know I'm in town, too, and he'll use you to stop me from killing the big bad. Or how about Aphorael? If he's dumped his last body, there's a pretty good chance he'll get his new one at the crazy farm."

Sam didn't have an answer for that one. Dean jumped on the opportunity.

"I need you to get this, Sammy: you're not the best judge of what's good for you right now."

Sam sat down on his bed again, drained of his will to fight, tears welling in his eyes. His brother was right.

"What am I supposed to do, Dean?" he asked resignedly.

* * *

"Stay with me," Dean said, leaning back against the table across from Sam's bed. "We'll put all the weapons in the trunk of the Impala, and I'll keep the keys with me. Unarmed, I'm pretty sure I can take you, and the doctor said you probably wouldn't try to hurt anybody but yourself anyway."

"But when I'm alone—"

"The bathroom door doesn't close or lock anymore, so that issue's taken care of," Dean snarked, trying perhaps too hard to lighten the mood.

"You've got to sleep sometime," Sam said fatalistically. "And that's usually when it's worst."

"We'll sleep in the same bed. I'm a light sleeper. You won't be able to get up without me knowing."

"Dean—"

"It's that or I cuff you to the bed. Which sounds more comfy?"

Dean watched Sam duck his head. He understood exactly what the kid was feeling: that Herculean effort to overcome pride, when pride was all that was left.

Sam nodded silently, a gentle surrender.

Dean's relief was palpable, but it was tempered by the desolate look in Sam's eyes. He'd been left with almost nothing: no confidence, no independence, and scant dignity. Keeping Sam's morale up was critical if he was going to hold back this disease and help Dean find and kill the thing responsible for his condition.

Dean came over to sit beside him. "I won't say it's going to be okay, 'cause you're not stupid and I don't know it will be," he said, looking down. "But you're thinking you can't survive this, and you can. You're stronger than you think. Stronger than I ever give you credit for. And no matter what happens, I'm proud that you're my brother."

Dean shook the tears out of his eyes. "That was a little lame, wasn't it?" he chortled brokenly. Sam sputtered on a sob and laughed, probably more heartily than the joke deserved.

"Seriously though, you better not hog the covers. I _will_ kick your ass, crazy or not," Dean teased. Sam laughed again, and a mischievous grin crossed his face.

"But I need more covers. I've got like twice as much surface area," he whined.

"That's like your secret, smart-person way of calling me short, isn't it?"

"Yes. Amazing. You've cracked the code."

"Fuck you, Sammy."

"Fuck you too, Dean."


	10. Side Effects

_After the last chapter, Chapter 9 is a bit of a break. There's still some angst, and there's still a tiny bit of grotesquery, but this is more about the fun. This is the last chapter of the second section; the third and final section begins with chapter ten. It's going to get pretty dark before the light comes back, so savor the humor while you can. _

_Thanks to my beta, K. Hanna Korossy, who graciously laughs at my jokes. Or, at least, graciously tells me she does._

_Thanks to all my reviewers; I love to hear what you think. _

_I hope you enjoy _Chapter 9

_Kohadril_

Chapter 9: Side Effects

Sam awoke to the sound of the alarm. He turned over and fumbled to find it, but something large and lumpy was in his way. He opened his eyes and found Dean's face staring back at him, about an inch from his nose. The resultant shock caused Sam to jerk away fast enough to completely fall off the bed.

From his position on the floor, groggy and confused, he heard Dean scoot over and hit the alarm button. After a moment, Dean's head appeared over the edge of the bed, looking down at him with a valiant attempt at a straight face. Sam stared back up at him with puppy dog eyes, silently pleading for mercy. Dean bit back a laugh with great difficulty.

Sam rolled his eyes and sighed. "Fine," he whispered.

Dean's face cracked into a mocking grin, and he burst out laughing. This, in turn, caused Sam to start laughing, albeit less heartily. Dean rolled onto his back and disappeared from Sam's vision.

"This is really weird, Dean," Sam mused.

"I know, man," Dean replied, still chuckling. "But that almost made up for it."

"Says the one who managed to stay _on_ the bed."

This elicited another peal of laughter from Dean. "You should have seen your face."

* * *

The man walked up to the counter in his new, unblemished black robes and collar, and the tailor looked at him curiously.

"Don't I know you?" he asked.

"No," the preacher said menacingly. "No, you were never in my flock."

"Must've seen you around town at some point, I guess," the tailor replied nervously. "Do you want me to box that up for you, Father? Or are you going to wear it?"

"I'll wear it, thank you, and I don't like to be called 'Father,'" the man replied with terrible calm. He put out his hand, and the tailor found himself flying backwards into the wall. The several pair of scissors on the table beside him came up off the surface and floated over, their tips pointing at his heart, shoulders, legs, and eye sockets. The preacher looked at him with deadly earnestness. "'Pastor' will be fine."

The scissors shot forward and after a flash of awful pain, the tailor felt no more.

* * *

They'd just been to the hospital, getting Sam some stronger medication. Matthews had interrogated Sam fairly thoroughly before providing the new meds, and Dean had learned some more awful truths about his brother's condition. Among other things, he knew the voices Sam heard included their father's, Sam's late girlfriend Jessica's, and Dean's own, and he knew what the voices had said.

One of the revelations in particular stuck in him painfully like a piece of shrapnel. As comfortable as the silence was as they drove along, Dean needed to say something.

"Sam," he started. Sam kept looking forward through the window, but Dean knew he was listening. "You told the doctor that when you hear me…I say you can't do anything right, and that you'll never change."

Dean looked over briefly to gauge reaction, just in time to see a flash of pain shoot through Sam's eyes. The kid didn't turn his head.

"You know I don't think that, right?" Dean asked, as nonchalantly as he was able. He glanced over at his brother again. Sam clenched his jaw for a moment, eyes just a little misty. He looked back gratefully.

"Yeah," he whispered.

* * *

Back at the motel, they were doing their best with what little they had. Matthews hadn't given them any of his newer case files; apparently he'd broken the law for them as much as he was going to. Still, there were a few of the new cases that were publicly known, and Sam had marked them all down on a large real estate map. Blue Sharpie meant "residence," red Sharpie meant "workplace." Even with the new data, there wasn't any noticeable pattern, and his laptop statistics software had failed to detect anything either.

Sam's head ached and he felt foggy. As awful as the night before had been, he'd actually gotten more sleep than he had in a while, so what he was feeling was the new medication. It was certainly powerful, and Sam's mind felt like it was running a few cycles slower than usual. At the same time, he wasn't hearing any voices, and he was more than willing to suffer the side effects so long as that was the case.

Dean had already called everybody they could think of who might know anything about the monster, or the Anasazi. He'd come up with nothing. He was now busying himself going through each of their journals a page at a time for anything that looked like it might be useful.

"How's it going over there?" Sam queried.

"I swear, Wikipedia would tell me more than this," Dean bitched. "How about you?"

"Brick wall. There's just no pattern here."

"Can I take a look?" Dean asked, walking over to look at the map sprawled across the bed.

"Sure," Sam replied, looking back to his laptop screen and searching for some statistical tool he hadn't tried yet. As he did so, Dean picked up one of the Sharpies next to him and started to draw on the map. "H—hey! What the hell are you doing?"

"Keep your shirt on, Sammy," Dean teased. He continued to draw carefully, making a big circle around all of the known cases—the smallest circle that would fit them all—and putting an "X" at the center of it. "I think we look there."

It came to Sam in an instant; since there had been no cases outside of Jeremiah, whatever power the creature was using to make people crazy had a finite range. That range could be expressed as the radius of a circle. That circle, in turn, could be estimated from the available data as the smallest circle encompassing every point. It was rough, and it was incomplete, but the center of the "real" circle-of-effect was probably close to the center of the one Dean had just drawn. There was a good chance they'd find the creature there.

It was remarkably simple. Obvious, even. A deep discomfiture spread through Sam's gut as he wondered why he hadn't thought of it.

* * *

At the center of Dean's circle was a series of undeveloped low hills and woods north of town. They were on their way out to it, prepared for a long grid-search of several square miles of wilderness. They had just hit downtown when they picked up a call on the police scanner. A cop was babbling to dispatch about a bizarre homicide a block from their location.

"Did he just say 'pinned to the wall with scissors'?" Sam balked.

"Yeah, I think he did," Dean agreed, screeching to a halt at the side of the road. "Looks like our hike is postponed."

The brothers got out of the car, and Dean went to the trunk for the FBI windbreakers.

"Won't work," Sam cautioned. "With the quarantine, nobody will be stupid enough to think we're state police or feds."

"That's a good point," Dean admitted. He thought for a moment, then an evil grin blossomed across his face. "Sammy, can you still do that gross thing with your shoulder?"

"Yeah…" Sam replied. It took a moment for him to see the relevance, then he got it. He looked at his brother annoyedly. "No, I'm not doing that."

"Why not?"

"Because it fucking hurts, that's why! And it won't work"

"It totally will. Town like this, there's like one guy at the scene right now. All I need you to do is yell a little and pull him away for like ten seconds so I can get in. I'll be out before the detectives even show up," Dean said. "You got anything better? We don't have a lot of time."

"…God damn it," Sam whispered.

* * *

"Okay, the shop is just around the corner. I'm going to go around the back way, through the alley. You got your story straight?"

"Yeah. Tripped on the sidewalk, tried to catch myself on the fire escape, yanked my shoulder out," Sam repeated.

"You gotta be loud, dude. I need him to come all the way around the corner to find you."

"I get it."

"Try to look cute and pathetic, too. Like a kitten stuck in a tree or a puppy in a storm drain."

Sam looked up at Dean hatefully.

"That's it! That's the look!" Dean teased gleefully. "Oh, wait, that's your mad face. It's hard to tell."

"Shut up," Sam gritted with embarrassment. He knew exactly how to make Dean stop. He sat down against the building, adjusting his left shoulder in its socket, cradling his left elbow in his right hand. Dean went humorously pale.

"You need any help?" Dean asked nervously, suddenly unable to look directly at Sam.

"No, man. I got it," Sam groused. "Now go. I think you threw up the last time you saw me do this."

"I did not," Dean called, already heading the other way.

"Did too," Sam mumbled to himself. He arranged his arms again, getting into position. He waited about a half a minute, then braced himself. He whispered his final count: "1…2…_3!_"

He pushed his left arm up with all his strength, and when he felt his shoulder pop, he started to scream his lungs out.

* * *

Dean flinched instinctively when he heard his brother scream, but the cop guarding the tailor shop door almost immediately took off to investigate. _Good job, Sammy_, Dean thought to himself with a narrow smirk.

He quickly and quietly made his way into the shop. The scene did not disappoint: seven pair of scissors of various sizes and shapes pinning the tailor up against the wall. There was a lot of blood.

"Whoa," Dean breathed. He brought up the video camera and did a 360 degree scan of the scene, paying special attention to the body of the victim. It took a few minutes to take all the various readings.

From outside—and all the way around the corner—he heard Sam yell again, which signaled that the cop had just started to help Sam set his arm. Sam had promised to draw that process out.

Dean searched the place carefully, finding a sooty residue in the dressing room and on the countertop. He scraped a sample into a plastic bag and waved it beneath his nose. Rotten eggs. Sulfur. That was all he needed. As quickly as he was in, he was out, and he was back in the alley by the time the second police cruiser arrived.

* * *

It had taken Sam a while to make it back to the car; the officer must not have known how to set a shoulder. Sam plopped down in the passenger seat next to Dean, rubbing the joint gently and wincing as much as his scowl would allow.

"Nobody can resist an injured Sammy," Dean mocked. Sam didn't so much as turn his head. "How many—"

"Five tries," Sam growled. "I had to teach him how, and it still took the guy five fucking tries."

"Ouch," Dean chortled.

"No, you don't—You do _not_ get to laugh at me! I just ripped my shoulder out of its socket and taught a know-nothing dipshit future mall security guard how to shove it back in!" Sam raged, reducing his brother to helpless laughter. "I had to convince him not to call an ambulance _twice_!"

"Stop, stop, man, you're killing me!" Dean gasped.

Sam looked away in a huff, as much to cover his own smile as to convey his anger. It was a bizarre feeling, the ebullient humor in his chest, because he genuinely _was_ angry. But he had missed this. It was like the feeling he'd had that morning, when Dean had laughed at him for freaking out and falling off the bed. This was normal. This was how it was _supposed_ to be.

Dean eventually calmed down. "Sorry," he chuckled.

"Did you get anything?" Sam demanded coldly.

"Yeah," Dean said, forcing a straight face. "Sulfur residue. Looks like Pastor Evil is back in town."

* * *

Things had changed. As much as they needed to find this creature and kill it, there was a demon looking for them who meant business.

"Do we even know it's Aphorael?" Sam questioned. "We know he's the kind of demon who needs belief to make him powerful, so how would he get his powers back?"

"Who the hell else would it _be_? We exorcised that one in Halstadt; there's no way he's made it back already. And the chances of two demons showing up in the same place, at almost the same time, without being related in some way? Like a bazillion to one."

"Maybe Aphorael had summoned more than one demon before we stopped him."

"Come on, Sammy!" Dean shouted, the frustration getting to him a little. "Big demons summon little demons. And little demons can't do anything like what I saw in that store. You know this stuff!"

In the silence that followed, he expected Sam to give him something back, to hold to his position and argue it, make a point Dean hadn't thought of. It didn't occur to him that Sam might not have one. So it came as a surprise when Sam just looked away and nodded, mumbling "Yeah, you're right."

"Yeah, I am right," Dean said uncertainly, watching his brother carefully. "Still, he's not the top priority."

"Why not?" Sam wondered aloud. Once again Dean's frustration spiked; what was with the stupid questions?

"Dude!" Dean practically yelled. "He pinned a guy to the wall with _seven_ pairs of scissors. He's trying to get our attention. If all he wanted was revenge, he wouldn't be advertising; we could bolt and he'd never find us. He risked that because _this_ was a faster way of distracting us."

"Yeah, sorry," Sam acquiesced.

Dean could have sworn he saw his brother wince. He felt a pang of guilt. Then he had a thought, and the guilt doubled. He softened his demeanor considerably. "Is something wrong, man?" he asked gently. "Are you…hearing things?"

"No," Sam replied, looking caught and clearly fighting back his feelings. "I'm fine."

"You're not fine," Dean said. "You're distracted. I want to know why."

"I'm not hallucinating," Sam said coldly, and Dean believed him. It just didn't answer his question. "Let's get back to—"

"No." Dean interrupted. "That's not how this works anymore, Sammy. You're going through something, you don't just push it down and get back to work. That attitude almost got you killed last night."

They sat there in silence for a moment, and Sam seemed to be struggling. Finally, he looked at Dean with as much calm as he could muster, trying, Dean could plainly see, to retain some semblance of strength. "I think it's the drugs. They…uh." Sam laughed painfully and averted his eyes. "They slow me down a lot." He gave Dean a vulnerable half-smirk.

Dean felt like shit. "God, Sammy, I'm sorry."

"Not your fault."

"I meant for bitching you out."

"So did I," Sam said soberly. "You didn't know. Can we get back to work now?"

* * *

By the time they'd hammered out their strategy, it was late. They would have to pick up the hunt in the morning.

They had secured the doors and windows with lines of salt. Sam was already in bed, and Dean was brushing his teeth. Dean was using the time, what little time he had alone, to reflect.

Things weren't normal, as much as they pretended they were. Ever since they'd gotten up that morning, ever since Sam had fallen off the bed and given Dean permission to laugh at him, things had seemed to fall back into their natural order. But it was an illusion, and a fragile one.

Sam wasn't fine. He was broken, he was hurting, even when it looked like he wasn't. Dean didn't have a clue how to deal with that. When he treated Sam like he was fragile, it made his brother feel weak. And when he treated Sam like normal, he ended up hurting him by forcing him to confront just how deficient he was. He needed to find a balance between those extremes, some way to keep what normalcy he could without making Sam deal with unrealistic expectations.

Dean knew the teasing had helped, as much as Sam had tried to hide his mirth. So that was something. Not much, but something.

He spit in the sink and rinsed his mouth out, then came out to his side of the bed and sat down. Sam wasn't asleep, Dean could tell, but he was rolled onto his side and his eyes were closed, so he was at least trying to get there. Dean slid into bed next to his brother and turned out the lamp. His thoughts kept him awake for a while.

He'd told Sam he needed his help; that was how he'd gotten him to stay. If Sam became convinced he wasn't capable, if the drugs made him dull enough, he might try to leave again. And that was a possibility Dean couldn't bear. There was so much more to Dean's reticence to let Sam go than utilitarian efficacy and safety concerns. Even if Sam couldn't help him at all, even if he was completely useless on the hunt, Dean still _needed_ him.

What kind of coward was he that he couldn't say it?


	11. Omen Formation

_Thank you all for waiting this long. I have been having a great deal of trouble writing recently. I hope I've fought through the worst of it._

_Thanks to all my readers and especially my reviewers. You make this worth it._

_  
Thanks to my beta, K. Hanna Korossy. This chapter would not be nearly what it is without her efforts._

_Enjoy _Chapter 10.

_--Kohadril_

Chapter 10: Omen Formation

This time it was night, and the field was filled with desiccated corpses. He stood at the altar and a shadow loomed. He held a hysterical man tightly, keeping a knife at his throat.

The thing came upon them, broad and black and enormous, long and low like a serpent but chitin-clad, with an arrow-point head and scythe-like teeth. Blood red boils protruded through the cracks in its armored carapace. It stopped before them, the front section of its body rising up like a crested cobra, and it loosed a keening cry.

* * *

Dean was unsure why he'd awakened, but the bed was shaking. It took a moment for him to perceive that Sam was thrashing around beside him, wheezing and whining in fear. In a flash, he was fully awake, and he reached out a hand and shook his brother gently. Sam responded only by whimpering louder and batting at Dean's hand, stretching and trying to get away.

Dean fought through his brother's defenses and leaned over him, grabbing Sam by the shoulder. The kid was completely soaked in sweat. Dean shook him again, harder this time. "Sam!" he yelled.

Sam gasped and opened his eyes, staring up at his brother confusedly. He looked around for a few seconds, blinking, trying to figure out what was happening.

"What is this, wrestling practice?" he asked sarcastically, catching Dean a little off guard.

He laughed. "Yeah, and you're pinned, as usual." Dean smirked and rolled off of his brother. He sat up against the headboard and looked down at Sam.

"Hilarious," Sam mumbled distantly. He stared up at the ceiling and Dean waited.

"What did you dream about?" he finally asked. If Sam wouldn't start this on his own, he'd do it for him.

"Same weird stuff," Sam replied cautiously, and for a moment Dean feared he was being lied to again. Sam seemed to fight off his reticence, though, and spoke again. "There was more this time. I saw the monster, and there was this guy…"

Dean waited again, partly for Sam's benefit and partly for his own. Sam grimaced and rubbed his head.

"Headache?" Dean asked.

Sam nodded lightly, then he squinted and groaned, bringing up his other hand. He clenched his jaw, his muscles tensed, and Dean knew something was seriously wrong.

"No," Sam whined desperately, squirming in pain. He started to roll onto his right side, away from Dean, but Dean pulled him back the other way, and after a brief resistance, Sam let him. Dean brought them together, and his brother curled up against him, trembling, as the vision took him.

* * *

He stood his ground in face of the screeching behemoth, and with a defiant, warlike scream, he drew his knife across the struggling man's throat, spilling his blood upon the altar.

The creature tensed and struck, and the world faded.

* * *

Sam cried out in pain as the vision ended, the strain of two visions so close together almost more than his mind could bear.

"You're okay," Dean said soothingly, not quite able to keep the fear out of his voice. "You're okay, Sammy, come on."

Sam vaguely perceived that Dean was holding him tightly, a strong right arm looped around his back beneath his shoulders, a left hand at Sam's side. His head lay against Dean's chest. He struggled to move: the position wasn't exactly comfortable, but his muscles felt heavy and useless, and his head like it might explode at the slightest provocation.

Sam focused his eyes, a significant accomplishment, and Dean seemed to notice.

"Sammy? You here with me, man?"

Sam whimpered in the affirmative and tried to nod his head.

"Can you talk?"

That was a good question. Sam moved his mouth around a little bit before finally forcing out a meek, "Yeah."

"Can I…uh, let go now?" Dean ventured uncomfortably. Sam had thought he'd never ask.

"Yeah."

Dean slowly and carefully pulled Sam off of him and laid him on his back. Sam held his breath; everything hurt. Dean seemed to notice his discomfort. "You okay?"

As much as Sam wanted to say yes, he couldn't. He hurt too much to be okay. He shook his head gently.

"Head?"

"Everything. Head's worst," Sam slurred, squinting up at Dean. The memory of the vision was starting to push its way back into his consciousness. His head throbbed again, and he saw himself slit the helpless man's throat. He grunted, as much out of revulsion as pain. "I killed somebody…"

Dean brought his hand up, stopping him. "I'm all for sharing, man, but right now, you look like the living dead," Dean said quietly. "You need to get some sleep."

Sam acceded without a fight, but that didn't change anything. As much as he wanted to lay off his brother, as much as he needed to feel independent and strong and capable, he couldn't keep it in. Not now. Not with all this pain. He took a shuddering breath and turned onto his side, away from Dean.

Dean must have heard the sound, because he reached his left arm over Sam's side, draping it protectively across him. It was an unthinkable display of affection, something Sam hadn't known Dean was capable of. Sam almost pulled away, but came to the sickening realization that he couldn't. Allowing himself to be held like this was an equally unthinkable display of weakness, but at this point, he had nothing left to lose: not his pride, not his strength. Not his manhood, certainly. Those things had already been taken away.

All that was left was fear. So Sam let his brother hold him, closed his eyes, and tried to go to sleep.

* * *

What woke Dean this time was the sound of car doors slamming outside the motel room. He tensed instinctively, carefully pulling away from Sam and turning to face the door. It was light, and when he glanced at the clock, he noticed it was almost 8:30. They had slept right through the alarm.

"Fuck," Dean whispered to himself just before the first shot sounded. The door splintered, a dime-sized hole appearing in it through which daylight spilled into the room. Dean rolled back to Sam and shoved him off the bed, and Sam crashed to the ground between the wall and the bed with a startled cry. More gunshots sounded, more holes appearing in the door and walls. "Stay down!" Dean yelled, rolling off his side of the mattress and dropping into the space between the beds.

Dean looked for a gun before remembering that all the weapons were secured in the trunk of the car. Then, on a countertop just across the room, he saw his cell phone. Shit, was he really willing to call the cops? He didn't suppose he had much choice. He brought himself up into a racing start stance.

He bolted for the phone, but just before he reached the counter, he heard another gunshot. Pain flashed through his side and he dropped instinctively.

"DEAN!" Sam yelled, his head peeking over the bed.

"Stay there!" Dean yelled again, reaching up and grabbing the phone off the countertop, holding his left flank with his free hand. It felt wet, but he didn't have time to look at it. He started to dial, but stopped when the gunshots did. He heard car doors slamming again, then tires screeching out of the parking lot.

Sam rushed over to him, dropping down beside him.

"Sammy," Dean said sternly, grimacing. "Pack our stuff. As fast as you can. We need to be out of here before the cops show up. Or before those inbred militia hicks decide to come back and finish the job."

"You're hurt," Sam replied worriedly, pulling up Dean's shirt and inspecting the wound. "It looks like it's just a graze, but you need…"

"You can sew me back up when we find a new place," Dean gritted authoritatively. "Get us packed up. We need to go _now_!"

Sam looked at Dean uncertainly. "Okay," he agreed, not without difficulty.

* * *

They had managed to get out of there just ahead of the police, and Sam found them a room across town with little difficulty. They were in the bathroom, and Sam was in the process of sewing up his brother's wound, which was high on his left side.

"It'd be pretty tough to sew this up myself," Dean commented transparently, wincing as Sam pulled the needle through.

"If I hadn't been here, you'd have had a gun," Sam replied coolly, trying to control his anger. "You wouldn't have had to try to get to the phone. You wouldn't have gotten shot."

"Yeah, you're right. This is all your fault," Dean groused sarcastically. "Get off it, man."

"Wish I could. I almost got you killed," Sam whispered darkly.

"Just stop it!" Dean yelled, a little more desperately than Sam expected. "We had this conversation. You're safer here with me."

"Yeah, but _you're_ not. Why is it always about keeping _me _safe? Why the hell can't I take care of you?"

"By leaving?" Dean grunted, flinching as Sam ran the needle in again.

"No!" Sam yelled back, progressively unraveling. "I don't want to leave, man. But I'm putting you in danger by being here. The drugs make me too stupid to help. And I'm not that much safer with you anyway. I mean, Aphorael already has a new body, and how the hell would Washington even find out if I was admitted?"

"So what the hell is keeping you here?" Dean asked angrily. "I mean, you've clearly thought this through."

Sam looked down and fixed his attention on his work, avoiding Dean's eyes as much as he could. He knew exactly what was stopping him from leaving, and for whatever reason, he decided to cop to it.

"I'm scared," he whispered. "After that last vision, how much it hurt; after what I saw, and with all this stuff happening to me," Sam couldn't stop himself at this point. "I'm terrified."

The anger left Dean's face instantly, replaced with a disgusting kind of pity. "It's okay, man. You've got every right to be scared."

"It's not fucking okay!" Sam shouted back, angry, desperate tears in his eyes. "I'm putting my brother in danger because I'm scared to be alone. What kind of man does that make me?"

"Sam…" Dean had a hangdog, guilty look in his eyes.

"Don't look at me like that," Sam mumbled. He poured some alcohol onto the now fully sutured wound. Dean yelped in pain as Sam stood to leave. "Put a bandage on it. You'll be fine."

* * *

Dean was reclining on his new bed, Sam sitting across from him. Everything seemed as if it were falling apart, and Dean had to be the one to keep it all together. It was unbelievably hard. But not, he realized, as hard as what Sam was going through.

"My guess, the bastard had us followed after we left. I wasn't really looking for it, so I didn't notice," Dean concluded. "He gave us some time to get out of town, and when we didn't, he sent those guys to scare us off."

"He didn't follow us this time," Sam said. "I was careful."

"Yeah, I know."

"So what do we do now?"

"Same thing we were going to do before those dipshits shot up our room. Find that creature."

"And what do we do then?" Sam asked. "What's the whole end game strategy here? Do we shoot it? We don't have a clue how to kill this thing. And if it's anything like what I saw last night…"

"Right, yeah. You said you saw it. What did that son of a bitch look like anyway?"

"It didn't look like anything I've ever seen, even in books. And it was huge. It's gonna take a whole lot of firepower to kill something that big."

"What else did you see? You said something about killing somebody last night."

"I…slit some guy's throat. Above the altar. Spilled his blood all over it. Except, I don't think it was me. I think what I saw was the past."

"And the second vision?" Dean inquired.

"There weren't two visions. There was just one; when you interrupted it, I got the second one when I woke up, showing me the end. It's like it had to show me the whole thing."

Dean looked down guiltily, not that he could have known any better. "So, I shouldn't wake you up from nightmares anymore?"

"I don't know. I guess not," Sam mumbled. "Shit, Dean, what the hell do I know? Everything's so fucked up."

"Not for much longer, man. This is a farm town; there's gotta be some dynamite around here somewhere. We'll find it, find the creature before it wakes up, and blow the thing into tiny little bits. Then you'll get better, and we can stop being cuddle buddies."

"What makes you think killing this thing will make me better?" Sam asked.

"What makes you think it won't?" Dean shot back with a cocky half-smirk.

Sam looked up at him skeptically. "Dean, you're my brother, and I'd die for you, but that is a terrible argument," Sam chortled.

"Whatever, I wasn't on the debate team in high school. Because unlike my brother, I wasn't a total dork."

"You know, if I killed you, I could get away with it by telling them I'm crazy," Sam snarked. "Just something for you to think about."

* * *

It had taken them the rest of the day to acquire the dynamite they needed. It was dark and they were on their way back to their new motel room, driving back along a winding country road well outside the center of town.

"You realize, if we get arrested now, we're going straight to Guantanamo Bay," Sam said pointedly.

"Yeah," Dean agreed. "I guess I'm cool with that."

The engine sputtered for a moment, then completely died. The headlights went off.

"What the hell?" Sam said as Dean turned the car onto the side of the road with what momentum remained. He turned the key several times to no effect. Sam grabbed a flashlight from the glove compartment and turned it out the passenger-side window. He saw a figure standing in the distance, a figure in a long black robe. "Dean, pop the trunk."

"What?"

"Pop the trunk and get out of the car NOW!"

Dean looked where Sam's light was pointing just as the figure's hand shot up, and every window in the car shattered.


	12. Fear

_A couple of things need to be said about this chapter._

_First: nothing in this chapter is meant to endorse the purchase or use of the Colt or Magnum Research-licensed IMI Desert Eagle handgun. At no caliber is this weapon worth your time. The only reason it is referenced here is that we know Dean has one from the episode _Something Wicked_, and it IS a damn big gun. For a variety of technical reasons, it is basically never the best gun for any job. It is, however, exactly the type of gun that Dean would think was cool. _

_Second: this chapter jumps around a little bit, I'm going for grit and realism, except in one segment. If it works, it'll be awesome. If it doesn't, it could get pretty cheesy pretty quick. Let me know if I pulled it off. _

_I haven't done this in a while, but in case you were wondering, I still disclaim stuff. Whatever stuff I didn't make up, at least._

_Enjoy _Chapter 11

_Kohadril_

Chapter 11: Fear

"Holy shit!" Dean yelled as he hit the trunk release and bailed out of the car. Sam was already out and on his way back to the trunk. The demon approached slowly, almost casually, as they scrambled for their weapons.

Sam grabbed his brother's Desert Eagle, the largest handgun they had, not so much for the caliber as for the fact Dean had just loaded it with blessed ammunition. Maybe the combination of a half-inch wide Action Express round and the vengeance of an angry God would slow the preacher down. Sam took aim—the oncoming figure didn't make any move to defend himself—and fired.

The first shot staggered the preacher; the second took him to his knees. Smoke rose from the wounds the weapon inflicted as the blessed lead burned the demon from within. He bowed his head for a moment, and Sam almost let himself believe he'd done it.

Then the demon looked back up at him, grinning in a way that suggested he was as surprised at his resilience as Sam was. Dean, beside Sam now and holding their Beretta and M1911 pistols in opposite hands, opened fire as the demon began to rise. The demon pushed forward, even as the bullets pummeled him. Sam aimed at the host's heart and double-tapped it—no mean feat with a gun that large, at that range, in the dark—and this time the demon remained standing, if only barely. Dean continued to fire with the Beretta, having spent the M1911 clip, and Sam put his next round directly between the demon's eyes.

The demon kept coming, and Sam realized they weren't going to kill this thing today. Dean gave him a look that suggested he felt the same way. Dean dropped the now-spent Beretta and pulled an ancient pineapple fragmentation grenade out of the trunk. Sam adjusted his aim.

He put the last two rounds of the Desert Eagle's clip in his target's knees, dropping the demon instantly. Aphorael yelled in anger and thrust a hand out at Sam, flinging him to the ground with tremendous force, but failed to notice the metallic sound of Dean's grenade landing next to him.

Sam's head was swimming—he'd hit the ground hard—and he was having trouble moving to cover. Dean pulled him behind the car and covered him with his body. A thunderous crack and a brilliant flash announced the grenade's detonation.

* * *

Dean allowed no time after the explosion, practically lifting Sam off the ground as he crammed him into the back seat of the car. He got behind the wheel and turned the key, elated when it roared to life.

He yanked the steering wheel around and gunned the engine, coming around to face the demon's prone body. It was difficult to make out through the spider web of windshield cracks, but he saw it well enough. Aphorael looked up at him, his body torn to shreds, his chest open and his viscera hanging out. For a nauseating second Dean could see it regenerating. Then he hit the gas, getting a mildly satisfying view of the demon's furious face just before impact. The car lurched as it rolled over the demon, and Dean floored it as soon as the back wheels returned to the pavement.

"What the fuck was that?" Sam moaned from the back seat, apparently having regained lucidity.

"Road kill," Dean said with a cocky grin. "He hurt my baby, and my baby just got some revenge."

"That would be really touching if you weren't talking about your car," Sam quipped, crawling carefully into the front seat. "I'm fine, by the way."

"Really? That's great," Dean said with a mockingly uninterested tone. "Seriously, man, I'm checking that out as soon as we get home. Concussions are bad news."

Dean felt energized. The adrenaline was pumping through him, and the harsh thrill of combat was both familiar and comforting. It was a heady feeling, and for a brief time he was caught up in it. He smiled to himself.

Then a stray thought brought reality crashing back down. The smile disappeared and the energy evaporated.

"Sam, give me the gun," Dean said in a low, heavy voice. He glanced over and saw Sam's moment of realization. He half-expected a fight, but Sam limply handed him the weapon. Dean put it in the driver's side door pocket.

"Sorry," Sam mumbled distantly. "Wasn't thinking."

* * *

When they got back to the motel they locked it down tight: salt lines along every entry point, warding sigils drawn on the doors and windows, furniture propped against the door.

"Do you think we should stay here tonight?" Sam ventured, sitting on the bed and untying his shoes with one hand, holding an ice-pack to the back of his head with the other. He was careful to avoid disturbing the secondary ring of salt around the bed. "We still don't know how he found us."

"I do," Dean said matter-of-factly. "That road took us right out near the place we were going to go look for the creature. He's waiting out there for us, which means we're close."

Another simple answer Sam hadn't thought of. He usually remembered maps and directions with great facility. He shook his head lightly and looked away.

"I don't like that look, man," Dean said, bringing Sam's attention back up to him. His older brother looked genuinely concerned.

"What look?"

"That 'I'm a fuck-up' look," Dean replied. "I'm okay with 'scared Sammy,' I can handle 'bitch Sammy,' but 'thinks he's a fuck-up Sammy' doesn't fly with me."

"Yeah? Why's that?" Sam asked absently.

"You used to look like that a lot in high school." Dean replied, his voice betraying the subtext. "It's bullshit—"

"Dean!" Sam interrupted harshly, forcing it out through his tightening throat. His voice broke into a whisper. "Just…don't. Don't tell me how strong I am. I can't fucking take it."

Dean shut up, but he didn't take his eyes off Sam. He just kept looking at him with an entirely un-Dean-like mixture of helplessness and anxiety. Sam fidgeted uncomfortably under that stare, unable to hide but unable to look his brother in the eye.

"We need to get some sleep," Sam eventually managed.

"Yeah," Dean whispered as he finally looked away.

* * *

Aphorael staggered down the dark road, back toward the forest he had been hiding in. He was almost healed already, the power he had been gifted with doing its work with astonishing speed. As he came upon the edge of the wilderness, a figure stepped out of the shadows in front of him, the mimicked form of the younger hunter. The demon felt his host's heart jump, and he was deeply discomfited by the being's starry-eyed gaze. He waited for it to address him, but the stranger said not a word.

"Yes, I have failed to kill him. They are more skilled than I thought," the demon said defensively. "I need more time."

"You all want more time," the being whispered ominously, "once you realize how quickly it's running out."

"It's not as if whatever you're doing to try to kill the boy is working, either!" Aphorael shot back. "So cease your looming and let me get on with the business of waiting for them."

"You wait close to where it rests. If you fail here—"

"I will not fail."

"Even if you succeed, you will fail. To succeed is only to delay failure," the messenger twisted. His voice was calm and distant, as though he were looking down on these events from far above where some greater picture could be seen. It was more than portentous. In the swirling maelstrom of the stranger's eyes was writ prophecy, heavy like stone and as unyielding.

Though the words themselves were absurd, they saturated the silent air, haunting the demon. He shook off his discomfort only with great difficulty. "Yes, well. Whatever the case, he will be dead before he and his brother can make it to the altar."

Aphorael pushed past the young-looking stranger, and as he stalked deeper into the woods, he could feel those dark and ancient eyes following him.

* * *

Sam reclined beside a glowing campfire at the center of the field on a warm, starry night. His clothes were different, just a woven breechcloth and a beaded necklace, but he felt neither exposed nor uncomfortable. He was not alone; he was surrounded by people he didn't recognize, but who were somehow familiar. He knew them, though their friendly faces were fuzzy and indistinct. They were kin, and he felt safe among them, protected and loved.

Time flashed forward and they were singing and dancing around the towering fire to the beat of an ancient drum. They smiled at each other, laughed and touched, and reveled in each other's company. Sam was taken with it, for it was like nothing he had ever felt. The power of simple music under a naked sky, of cathartic revelry by roaring firelight, of deep familial love unadorned by guilt or betrayal or resentment: these things were outside his experience. It did not make him forget his troubles, but it did not need to. If for only as long as the fire lasted, nothing mattered but this.

* * *

Sam awoke peacefully, and though his head hurt, he retained the feeling of comfort and safety the dream had left him with for a long moment. Then it slipped away, slowly but inevitably, the loving warmth dissipating and leaving him cold and afraid. It tore at him, to lose that, and he suddenly felt desperately alone. He shifted, turning to look at his brother for whatever comfort his presence would provide, but a voice stopped him short.

"_You're never alone, Sammy. I'm always here._"

It wasn't his brother. Sam looked to the front of the room, to the chair across from the bed, and shuddered deeply at what he saw. Not more or less than himself, but with eyes as black as midnight. Sam's heart practically leapt into his throat, and his eyes shot wide open. He bolted up into a sitting position and scooted to the headboard, as if to get as much distance between him and…the other him as he could.

"_Surprised?_" the demon-him taunted. "_You shouldn't be_._ You've felt me in your head a long time now. Didn't know what to call me, but you knew I was there. And now, I'm out here._"

There was barely a moment's hesitation this time, but through all the trembling and given how close he was to tears, Sam couldn't really take pride in that.

"Dean?" Sam asked tentatively before shifting to a more desperate plea: "Dean! Wake up!"

Dean groaned and rolled onto his back. "What is it, man?"

Sam's scrambled for something to say, but he couldn't find the words. Dean appeared to notice the silence and immediately brought himself up alongside his brother.

"What's going on? Are you seeing things?"

"_No kidding, big brother,_"the demon-Sam said, as though he really were talking to Dean.

Sam nodded his head, because he couldn't make himself say it out loud. He pointed at the chair, more shaking now than trembling. "Right there," he gulped fearfully. Dean looked to where Sam was pointing.

"_You know he can't see me. Pointing isn't exactly helpful, dipshit._"

Sam resisted the urge to respond. Even though he knew the answer, he had to ask. "You're telling me you don't see that?"

Dean hesitated a moment, and Sam knew, just knew, that Dean was wishing he could say yes. "No, dude. I don't see anything."

Even knowing it was coming didn't make that hurt any less. His whole chest tightened like a vise. Sam closed his eyes and gritted his teeth, trying to keep from breaking down.

"Who is it? What are you seeing?" Dean asked, his own fear beginning to leak into his voice.

Sam opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out.

"_Tell him, Sammy. Tell him what you're seeing,_" the thing needled. "_Tell him about the thing you're turning into._"

It felt like a knee to the solar plexus. Sam cringed. "I'm not…," he whimpered plaintively.

"You're not what?" Dean asked.

"_He's not exactly quick on the uptake, is he?_"

Dean's posture changed, and he rolled over in front of Sam, straddling the younger man's legs with his knees. He was now between Sam and his hallucination. Sam pulled away, surprised by his brother's sudden closeness, but Dean held on, pinning Sam's shoulders to the headboard with his elbows. Sam prepared to buck his hips, but Dean put his hands gently on the sides of Sam's face, pulling the younger man's head up and bringing their eyes together. The look in Dean's eyes—that firm, big-brotherly, "this is for your own good" look—sucked the will to fight right out of him.

"Sam, listen to me," Dean said. Sam nodded and complied, already feeling calmer. "I'm the only one here. Whatever you're seeing isn't real."

"_You know I'm real, Sam. No matter what he says._"

Sam winced and turned his head to look past Dean, and Dean slammed him back against the headboard, not hard enough to hurt but enough to leave Sam rattled. Dean pulled them back face-to-face.

"Sam, there's nothing there. Nothing real. I'm here, and I am real, and I will kick your ass if you don't stop listening to whatever the fuck you think is there and start listening to _me_."

"_What an asshole. I'm going to laugh for days after I kill him._"

Sam tried not to flinch, but he couldn't stop himself. Then he flinched again because at this point, he was genuinely afraid of his brother. Dean would never hurt him, but he certainly would smack Sam around some more if he thought he needed to. He brought his eyes back to Dean's as fast as he could, hoping he would get credit for the effort. Dean's expression softened, but he didn't loosen his grip.

"Good, Sam," Dean said quietly. "Keep your eyes on me."

Slowly…very slowly…Sam started to relax. It wasn't comfortable by any stretch of the imagination, and yet, there certainly was comfort in it. Sam hated to be manhandled and he hated to be told what to do, but right now, it felt _safe_. He didn't have to be in control. He didn't have to think about what to do. He didn't have to keep secrets or hold things back or protect other people. All he had to do was what Dean told him.

"_You're going to let him treat you like this? Whatever happened to strong, adult Sam, you puling little bitch?_"

Sam fought himself not to react. It wasn't easy. His throat tightened again, his eyes warmed, and a tear ran down his left cheek, but he didn't turn to look at the thing behind his brother, and he didn't allow his expression to change. He kept looking into Dean's eyes.

"Good, Sammy," Dean repeated, this time whispering. "Tell me what you're seeing."

Sam couldn't think of an answer to that question, and when he opened his mouth, all he found was a strangled sob. He broke eye contact and looked down.

Dean's reaction was swift and decisive, yanking Sam's head back up two-handed and tightening his grip, digging his elbows even further into Sam's shoulders, pressing his knees further into Sam's thighs. "Sam! Stuff the shame. We know where that goes, and you're not hiding things anymore. I'm right here, so _this _is where your attention is, okay?"

It hurt, and Sam gasped. His eyes shot back to Dean's. "Sorry, Dean. I'm sorry," he whimpered.

"Don't apologize. Just tell me what you're seeing," Dean said, still soft but this time stern. Sam worked hard to keep that eye contact despite what he was feeling. And he worked even harder for the courage to do as he was told.

"…It's me," Sam whispered, his cadence breaking as more tears started to flow, as it all started to come out. "It's me, Dean. It says it's the thing I'm turning into."

"Don't believe it," Dean said without hesitation. "Don't believe anything it says. It's a fucking hallucination, and you know that." Dean looked at him intensely, as if waiting for a response. "Tell me you know that."

Sam nodded. "Yeah," he managed.

"_He's right. I am a hallucination. Doesn't mean I'm not real, though. Doesn't mean I'm not inside your head._"

Sam let the words wash over him, let them pass without reaction, and tried to steady his breathing.

"That's it, kid. That's how you'll beat this thing. That big brain of yours. It can scare you, but it can't fool you unless you let it," Dean said soothingly. Some part of Sam's consciousness understood that wasn't completely true, but for now, the better part of him believed his brother.

They stayed like that for what must have been minutes but seemed like hours. It took a while for Sam to get used to the presence of his hallucination, but eventually he started to. Only then did Dean begin to relax his grip, and only after Sam was clearly in control again did he let go, if only long enough to get some more drugs from the bathroom. For the few seconds he was gone, Sam was alone with his mind's projection

"_Without him, you'd turn in a minute, you know that? The only strength you've got is borrowed._"

He knew that was true, but for now, he was grateful for whatever he could get.


	13. Control

_Sorry, guys. No new excuses for you, but I'll try to do better._

_This is a very introspective chapter; I'm trying to set up the final themes. I think we finally get to the root of some of Sam's issues here, as well as some of Dean's, and we learn a little more about the messenger and his relationship to the creature._

_The next chapter will bring us to the climax. I think you'll find the twists intriguing._

_Thanks for your patience, and enjoy _Chapter 12,

_Kohadril _

Chapter 12: Control

It was almost 6:00 AM. Sam had passed out a few hours before. The kid's head had slid down the headboard and onto Dean's arm, and at any other time, Dean would have shoved him off. Right now, though, he didn't want to risk waking him.

Dean hadn't slept, and from how he felt, he knew he wouldn't. Last night had been bad. Really, really bad. Sam had been on the razor's edge of losing it completely, and even with Dean doing everything he could think of, the hallucination hadn't gone away.

The nature of Sam's hallucinations, the character of his psychotic behavior, was very revealing. One of the things Dean found most disturbing about this disease was that it forced subconscious feelings and insecurities to the surface. He couldn't blame Sam for feeling like shit 24/7; he didn't want to imagine what it would be like if their roles were reversed, and Sam was seeing _Dean's _deepest fears and insecurities.

That was water under the bridge, though. Sam's privacy was already gone. The question was, where did they go from here? If they defeated this thing and Sam returned to normal, could Dean really pretend none of it had happened? That he hadn't seen the dark things that lived just outside his brother's conscious thought? Some part of Sam—some _big_ part of Sam—absolutely hated himself.

Dean had to think about that for a moment. Sam _hated_ himself. It just didn't sound right, even as a thought, even as a hypothetical. But the thing that was tormenting him was a creature of fear, and it certainly wouldn't have been so powerful if it hadn't picked Sam's worst fears to exploit. And what he feared most, it seemed, was that the world would be a better place without him in it.

But how could Sam even suspect that? Why was _this _Sam's vulnerability?

The answer came like a bolt of lightning. Because it always had been.

Sam's whole life, Dean had been better at everything that mattered to their father. They'd competed early and often, but the game had been rigged, their father had made sure of it. School, traditional sports, social skills: none of those had appeared to matter to John Winchester.

Sam made more mistakes hunting, too, because he wasn't the natural Dean was, and that led him to get talked down to and yelled at, over and over again. And with how sensitive he was—another flaw their father had tried to ground out of him—Sam took every injury someone else suffered because of his failure deeply to heart. The psychological endgame was simple: at some point the punishment and self-flagellation stopped motivating him and started making him think he couldn't do anything right. Sam reached that point at age 17, right at the time people were talking to him about college and his future.

In Dean's mind, even that wasn't a good enough reason for Sam to abandon them. Dean had gone to Sam's soccer games. Dean had seen Sam's high school play. Even if their father hadn't been proud of Sam, Dean had been. That this hadn't been enough for Sam still hurt.

But whatever confidence Sam had built up at college had been wiped away with his girlfriend's murder. Finding out her death, as well as their mother's, had been because of him, however indirectly, only fed Sam's self-hatred. Every little inkling of the demon's plan for him, every single death vision and every gifted child gone dark…how the hell had Dean not noticed this?

Dean's story wasn't much better than Sam's, he'd admit. In fact, Dean felt the same way Sam did. They might not have come by their feelings of worthlessness and self-loathing by the same road, they might not express them the same way, but when he got down to it, their wounds were the same. Right now, Sam couldn't hide any of it, couldn't suppress it. If anything good came of this, maybe it was that Dean understood his brother a little better. And maybe by helping Sam with his problems, Dean could heal too.

After all, that was what Sam didn't get. Dean didn't resent having to take care of him. In reality, that duty was all that was keeping his head above water. A safe, healthy, and relatively happy Sam was Dean's proof of self-worth.

The only question remaining was: what was Sam's?

* * *

Beside the fire again, the proceedings had taken on a mournful character. The fire was dimming, the drumbeat slowing, and there were tears.

There were embraces, also, and as loving as these were, so were they also wrenching. Sam knew now for certain he was among the Anasazi, at the end of their civilization. He knew this gathering, this group of dozens, was all that was left of a great people that had been destroyed by a power beyond them. And for the first time, it was all made clear, and the dreams made sense. These visions came not from the creature that was tormenting him, but from the ancient people that had long ago entombed it.

The women and children were being sent away, that they might bring the Anasazi way of life to a new home, that their ways, that their sacrifice, that their histories, that _who they were_ might not be forgotten. Sam embraced a woman, his wife, and another, his sister, a boy and a girl, his children, and now their faces were as clear as day. He had a beautiful family, and he was seeing them for the first time as they said their last goodbyes, and that was a pain he hadn't known. It wasn't the horrible, sickening, angry pain of being robbed of a loved one. Nor was it the dark, fearful pain of being left alone. It was just pain—honest pain—and it was how he knew he should feel, how he wanted to feel, and he was unashamed to feel it. So he wept with them, his family whom he had only just met, as the fire flickered and died.

Time flashed forward, and the hilltop was lit by torches. The last of their families had just disappeared over the eastern horizon, and from the southwest, they could almost feel it coming. At the old man's direction, they gathered together great stones and began to stack them over the blackened remains of the fire pit.

* * *

Sam was whimpering again in his sleep, but he didn't seem afraid. After the last time, Dean had resolved not to wake Sam up from his nightmares anymore. It was hard to feel his brother there, against his arm, crying, and not do something to help him, but it was better than hurting him. He just wished it would end, and Sam would wake up.

Sam stirred a little, and opened his eyes. Dean turned his wishing power to summoning scantily-clad supermodels, without success. He looked down at his brother, who was already embarrassedly withdrawing from his arm.

"Bad dream?" Dean asked.

"No," Sam responded, and Dean wondered whether Sam was really going to start lying to him again. "Not a _bad_ dream."

"You were crying," Dean said incredulously. He poked at Sam's cheek, where a tear had just broken free. "You still kind of are."

"Quit it!" Sam bitched, slapping Dean's hand away. "It was…sad. But I think I get it now."

"Get what?"

"The dreams. All of them. Something is trying to show me how to stop this creature."

Dean wanted to believe that, but it wasn't exactly easy. Sam had still been hallucinating when he'd passed out, and it didn't make sense to Dean that his brother would be crazy while awake and sane while asleep.

"That's great, man," Dean said noncommittally. "What about the demon? He gone?"

Sam looked around the room, and Dean saw a genuinely heartening thing: an elated smile from his younger brother. "Yeah," Sam replied hopefully. "It remitted again, I guess."

"Good. Maybe we can kill this thing before it comes back," Dean said, his mind already working through how hard this was going to be even with a semi-functional Sam. "Okay, so, tell me about your dream."

"I saw them building the altar," Sam answered.

"And that made you cry?"

"No, man. I saw…it's like I was one of them, and I had to let my family leave so they'd be safe—look, the important thing is the altar, I know it." Sam almost sounded like his usual self, excited and impassioned.

"The one you dreamed about killing somebody over?" Dean asked.

"Yeah. Maybe that's the way to stop the thing; spill somebody's blood on the altar," Sam said, a look of disgust spreading across his face.

"I don't know. Dynamite seems like a better bet. Don't have to worry about making sure the guy you bleed is the right one. Usually, with stuff like this, it can't be just anybody." Dean was engaging this only because he wasn't sure Sam was wrong about it. That didn't mean he wanted to encourage Sam to suggest it as a course of action.

"What if the dynamite doesn't work?"

"That's the thing about dynamite, Sammy. If you've got enough of it, and the thing you're trying to kill has a physical body, it always works."

"I guess," Sam said thoughtfully.

Dean's brain was in overdrive as he began to put together his strategy. It was a few seconds before he noticed Sam's silence. As soon as he did, though, he found Sam's eyes were on him, and he could feel the kid was trying to work up the courage to say something. He decided to force the issue. "What is it?"

"…uh, ha," Sam chortled, clearly trying to cover some real anguish. He paused to collect himself. "About last night. I thought I was losing it. I thought it was over."

"Hey, dude, it's all right," Dean tried to soothe.

"Yeah, well…I needed my big brother," Sam said meaningfully. "I don't know how you do it. I mean, if I had half the strength—" Sam's eyes went glassy and he looked away. "Just…thanks, man."

Dean wanted to reach out to Sam, but he understood he couldn't. Not now. It would just make Sam feel weaker, more dependent, and that would only play further into his psychoses. So he gave his brother a misleadingly confident smirk. "Don't worry about it."

* * *

Aphorael knew the messenger was watching him, even as he waited by the altar for the brothers to arrive. He couldn't sense it, and he had no proof, but his was a paranoia born out of fear. He was a demon of great power, but he understood there were things more fearful than evil. Beyond pain and suffering, anger and hate, jealousy and selfishness, there was the dark, hungry void. Men feared it more than anything, and demons were no different.

He did not know what would happen when the creature awakened. He could feel reality beginning to weaken, and though this meant that many demons would find their way into the world in the next few hours, this did not comfort him. More was going on here than a battle between good and evil.

But he had picked his side and would not change it. The power the messenger had over him was too great to ignore. And the chaos caused by the creature upon its awakening would be an excellent environment for a demonic invasion. Whatever havoc the messenger wished to wreak, Aphorael would not begrudge him, so long as there was world enough for his kind to fight over when the void's hunger was slaked.

* * *

_They come._

The messenger sensed it, even before the brothers set off. In the roiling chaos, the pieces moved with predestined precision. Like the universe itself, the confluence of random events yet yielded predictable outcomes.

The older one was no threat; he lacked the sight or power to affect the creature or the messenger. And while failing to kill the younger one, the messenger had at least poisoned his mind. The boy now feared the evil within himself more than the darkness looming above him, and the very gifts that might have given him the strength to stop the creature were tied to those fears. When the time came, he would be too afraid to do what was necessary.

The messenger's servant, the demon, feared him, but would not betray him. It was powerful, certainly, or at least it had been. Its manipulation of the insanity the creature wrought and the messenger directed had nearly unraveled the messenger's designs, for the demon had introduced order into the expanding catastrophe. Yet here he was now, serving the messenger's goals, no longer any threat. He had seen the demon's paths, and all of them ended this day.

The creature below stirred. It was his brother, as if by blood, for it was forged from the same primordial substance. But where the messenger was beyond time and space, the creature was chaos made material, shaped by human fears, loathing, dread, and thus tied inextricably to the very creatures whose subconscious darkness gave it form. Its purity thus was tainted, as anything material must be; for entropy can have no true form.

He remembered when the creature was defeated last. He had watched it destroy the Anasazi, and as it did, his power had grown. Its rise, its destruction of a static civilization, had empowered the messenger to weaken the walls of reality. So many things—evil, good, neutral, but universally unnatural—had come into being, before the creature had been entombed. It would be thus again, but this time they would not be stopped.

* * *

Dean drove the car numbly, barely attached to the outside world. Sam was still good, it seemed, but this wasn't going to be easy. In fact, it didn't even seem possible.

So much lately carried this aura of inevitability. The death of their father had felt almost predestined, even if it had been—as they suspected—his own choice. And Sam's gifts, and the unfolding mysteries relating thereto, were laden with dark portent.

But Dean didn't believe in fate. He believed in choice and action. However bleak things seemed, he knew better than to allow himself even a moment of hopelessness.

That was his strength, he knew. That was what Sam had always seen in him but had never been able to understand. It wasn't just that Dean didn't give up—Sam didn't give up, either—it was that Dean didn't believe things were ever out of his control. Experience had taught him that perseverance paid off, that fighting hard enough could win the day, and that if he ever let his guard down, bad things would happen. It wasn't a healthy lesson, but it was a useful one.

All the things he'd fought, all the supernatural creatures he'd slain, not one had been weaker than he. Every single one had powers beyond the scope of mortal men, but he'd beaten them all. Yet the ones that were capable of thought still underestimated him. That was a grievous mistake.

That wasn't even the worst mistake, though. The worst was attacking his brother.

These things didn't know what they were in for.

* * *

Sam was afraid. He could barely remember feeling any other way.

His head was clear. He wasn't hearing things, seeing things. He could recall his dreams now with perfect clarity, and was beginning to see what they were telling him.

But to tell the truth, he doubted them. Couldn't they be fake? Couldn't they just be hallucinations or delusions, like everything else? Maybe they were just normal dreams, their sensations heightened by his condition. How could he trust the things he saw in sleep when he could barely trust what he saw while awake?

He thought about his destiny again—Dean would smack him if he knew—and wondered whether all this proved it wrong. If he died here, today, then his "destiny" was just an empty prediction made by a demon with no greater control over the universe than Sam himself possessed. If he was just a pawn, just a vessel for fulfilling another's agenda, this was not the logical end.

Unless, of course, there were players mightier than the yellow-eyed demon. Sam remembered—bizarrely enough—_The Odyssey_. Odysseus was condemned by Poseidon never to return to his home, but his will was countermanded by the prophecy of Zeus. Was Sam stuck between two powerful beings, dueling for control over his fate? And if so, what could he do?

He'd lived his life without any control. Even when he'd tried to take it, it had been rudely ripped away from him again. Why should this be any different?

So he was afraid. Not that he would die, but that his death wouldn't mean anything. That his life would end because something bigger than he decided it must. Worse, Sam was afraid Dean would die that way too, swept up in the wake of his curse.


	14. Incapacitation

_This chapter is a big one, probably the longest one so far (I haven't checked). It's the beginning of the end of the story. _

_I want to thank everyone for waiting patiently, and my beta K. Hanna Korossy for keeping on me all this time. Thanks especially to my reviewers; you make it all worth my time._

Chapter 13: Incapacitation

"The key to this whole thing is doing enough damage to the demon to stun him so we can trap him," Dean said. They were still a few miles from the spot where they were to start their search, and he had just finished explaining his plan. "We'll probably need a half-hour to dig the hole, and another fifteen minutes to rig the dynamite. The exorcism is the x-factor, but as long as we've got him trapped it should be fine."

Sam nodded silently, but there was some doubt in the younger man's eyes.

"What?" Dean asked.

"Nothing," Sam replied meekly, as though he expected whatever qualms he had would be revealed as foolish or meaningless if he explained them.

"Seriously, dude. What?" Dean insisted.

"I don't know, man, I just don't know why I keep having these visions of how the Anasazi stopped this thing if we're not supposed to use what they show me," Sam replied, nearly apologetic.

No, Dean realized in that moment. This wasn't going to work. He pulled the car over to the side of the road.

"What's going on?" Sam asked, his head popping up to look at Dean.

"That depends on you," Dean said heavily. He turned to meet his brother's eyes. "Can you do this?"

Sam looked genuinely confused. "What?"

"Can you help me with this plan? Yes or no?"

"Dean, if this is about what I said, I know you're right—"

"It's not about what you said, it's about me having to push you to get you to say it," Dean interrupted in frustration. "Because you're right. My plan is shitty. It may be the best plan we've got right now, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't be thinking."

"I'm sorry," Sam tried.

"Don't apologize! Just get better!" Dean yelled. The words weren't even out of his mouth before his stomach shrank to the size of a Ping-Pong ball.

Sam looked stunned, hurt, and at least a little angry. "I would if I could," he whispered after an agonizing silence.

"Fuck." Dean sighed heavily. "I'm sorry, Sam. I know you're fighting as hard as you can."

"Then what do you want from me?" Sam asked, his voice betraying just a hint of the hysteria roiling within him. The kid had to be feeling like he was getting it from all sides now, and Dean could see how thin his veneer of control really was. There wasn't time, though, for empty ego-stroking. What Sam needed was a kick in the ass. Either he was strong enough to take it, or he wasn't.

* * *

"I want you to give me a sign that some part of my stubborn, preachy, know-it-all bitch-boy of a little brother is still in there," Dean challenged him. "You may not be hallucinating, but you don't look like you're sure you could put your pants on straight without help."

Sam was speechless, stuck between incredulity and indignation, and Dean jumped in again before he could figure out where to land.

"And I don't blame you, man. Really I don't. But if you go into this thinking you can't do anything right, you _will_ screw it up, and that'll get us both killed," Dean continued, his voice finally settling on a stern, authoritative tone. "So here's the deal: if you don't think you can do this—if you think I've got a better chance pulling this off alone—I'll take you to the hospital and you can ride it out there."

The silence that followed ached, and the seconds passed like hours. Sam wanted to scream at him, wanted to take off Dean's head for putting him in this position. Asking Sam to evaluate himself, to consider his own capabilities, was pretty goddamn cruel. It wasn't as if Sam needed reminders of how deficient he was.

He was being offered what he'd wanted at one point; that was true. Of course, since that time, he'd decided he was more afraid of being alone than of being a burden. Dean's arguments for them to stay together, his constant assertions that Sam could help him, had made Sam doubt his worthlessness. Now that Dean wasn't so sure, all Sam had to rely on were his own estimations of himself. And they were not good.

On the other hand, the chance of Dean's plan working without assistance was basically zero. Sam's part in the plan wasn't complicated, but it was impossible for his brother to do his own part as well as Sam's. There was a panic forming now, an intolerable anxiety balling up his stomach. Sam genuinely had no idea what to do. He didn't believe he could help—in fact, he thought it more likely he'd get in the way—but it was absurd to think of Dean trying to accomplish this by himself.

He might have come apart, except by chance he noticed the badly cracked windshield. He remembered that night on the road, when Aphorael had attacked them. The night he'd saved their lives with his quick reflexes and accurate shooting.

Realization flashed in his mind, and with it a surge of welcome and surprising strength. As ineffectual as this disease made him feel, it hadn't stopped him that night. All his training, all his skill, all his talents; they weren't gone just because this disease had diminished them. He wasn't a burden just because he wasn't as strong or capable as his brother.

And this, this was why Dean had no more encouraging words for him. He'd have resisted them. Right now, compliments were veiled insults; all they really meant was that Dean felt Sam needed emotional support. Dean had realized he couldn't prop Sam up anymore. Sam needed to find confidence on his own, or not at all. Miraculously, he had.

"I can't think, and I don't know how much longer I'll have a handle on what's real," Sam started. Dean's body seemed to go limp, as though robbed of some vital energy. Sam paused for a moment, bringing his newfound courage to bear. He raised his head and looked his brother square in the eye, daring, resilient, even competitive. "But I can still shoot straight. And you can't do this alone."

* * *

Dean couldn't hide his joy. He smiled broadly and clapped Sam on the shoulder. Sam's serious expression didn't change.

"There something else, big guy?" Dean asked with a smirk.

"Yeah," Sam breathed after a moment, hesitantly. It wasn't a comfortable sound, and Dean immediately recognized the guilty, sullen look on Sam's face. It was the one he got when he was about to say something he knew Dean really didn't want to hear. "If killing this thing doesn't stop this disease, and I keep getting worse…"

Comprehension came like a knife in the stomach, and Dean knew where his brother was going. The look made perfect sense. Anger seemed the appropriate reaction, but Sam was at least quick enough to finish his thought.

"I don't want to live like that," his little brother added bluntly. Even knowing it was coming didn't change how it felt to hear. For a nauseating moment, Dean considered that this was what failure sounded like. After all, if the kid he'd been protecting all this time hurt enough to want to die, Dean must have been doing a pretty awesome job. Even as a conditional, based on some hypothetical future, it was too painful, too wrenching, too ugly to even consider.

Even worse, this wasn't the first time Sam had asked this. How did he not understand? How did he not get that Dean was incapable of this? He would not pull the trigger that would kill the brother he'd twice pulled out of a fire, would not fire the bullet that would realize his greatest fear and leave him fully and finally alone.

"NO!" Dean yelled, startling Sam into jumping back in his seat. "Fuck that, Sammy. What is it with you and asking me to kill you, anyway? I keep telling you: no way in hell. Not ever."

That should have ended it. But Sam just sat there, a desolate look creeping across his face. "I'm not asking for a promise. I'm telling you so you'll know what I want. I mean, Halstadt…" Sam trailed off, clearly battling to hold his calm even as his eyes filled with tears. "What I saw in his eyes, that night in the car…it scared the shit out of me. It wasn't _him_ anymore, and some part of him knew it."

Dean was fighting this as hard as he could, but the fear in the kid's voice, the real mortal dread, was too powerful to ignore.

"I'm terrified, Dean," Sam admitted bleakly, his voice breaking. He swallowed audibly. "I'm more scared of ending up like that than I am of dying. So if you want to protect me from something? Protect me from that."

Dean didn't answer; his insides were so knotted up he wasn't sure he was capable of speech. He just stared at his brother with soft eyes and a set jaw, an unsettling mix of empathy for what Sam was going through and anger for what he was putting Dean through. He wasn't considering it. It was still absolutely unthinkable. But he couldn't deny that this time, at least, Sam's request sounded pretty reasonable.

* * *

Dean lay prone in the tall grass at the edge of the hill's flat summit. He'd crawled up the last few feet of the hill, fully aware that the demon would likely be near the altar and watching. Sam's visions hadn't proved particularly useful overall, but they had given them a good understanding of the terrain of the hill. Dean approached from the side closest to the altar and farthest from civilization. From through the grass, he could see the demon pacing perhaps fifty yards away. Dangerously close, but also dangerously distant.

In his hands Dean cradled a very, very large weapon; an invention of his own. It was a black-powder flintlock; a truly old-school weapon that Dean had modified to fire special ammunition: a .60 caliber hollow ball filled with tiny holes stopped up by a quick-burning resin. It could be filled with a variety of substances: dead man's blood for vampires, silver nitrate for shape-shifters, or holy water for demons.

This was the first situation they'd ever encountered in which the weapon would be practically useful. It couldn't kill a demon on its own, and modern firearms were faster, cheaper, and much more accurate. Even a crossbow was faster to reload, and a silver bullet from a .45 was just as good against a werewolf as a high-caliber musket-ball leaking nitrate. But the blessed weapons they'd used so far hadn't had sufficient power to stun the demon for the time they needed. This weapon might. The combination of the size of the round and the holy water that would slowly leak into the demon's body after impact would have to be enough.

Of course, it all relied on him hitting his target. Dean didn't worry about his marksmanship. He worried about the flintlock's precision, especially with a round as aerodynamically unsound as the one he was going to fire.

Dean put his worries aside and braced himself, as he had a thousand times before. In a few minutes, Sam was going to come up the hill from the opposite side. Then this party would begin.

* * *

On the other side of the hill, Sam was picking himself up off the ground, his head screaming. He leaned back against a tree, trying to find some position that would alleviate his anguish, with no success. Bizarrely, no vision was forthcoming, and it was beginning to worry him. He reached out for his satchel, dropped when the pain had started, for his water. Instantly, it was in his hand, and a new jolt of pain shot through him.

Sam cracked his eyes open. He'd expected to have to reach farther. But there it was. He grabbed his canteen from inside the bag and took a deep swig.

"_It's easier here,_" said someone immediately beside him.

Sam spun to face the sound and found his brother. "Dean, what are you doing here?" he sputtered confusedly. "You should be set up on the other side of the hill by now."

"_I'm not your brother,_" the figure immediately admitted.

Sam's stomach turned. He brought his hand to his head. "Oh shit," he whispered, trying not to panic. "Oh shit oh shit not now…"

"_I'm not a hallucination, either,_" the not-Dean continued. "_I'm here to help you._"

"Like I'm going to believe that," Sam mumbled, as though he were saying it to himself. His mind was racing; how was he going to do his part without being distracted? Was he even going to be sane long enough to try?

"_That pain you feel? You're having a vision._"

"My hallucinations hurt, too," Sam gritted.

"_That's true. There's nothing I can say to convince you. But it's important that you listen to me anyway._"

"Then stop looking like Dean," Sam replied. "Show me who you really are."

There was a flash, and Sam was back around the Anasazi campfire, looking down into a carved bowl filled with clear water. He caught a glimpse of his own reflection, another alien-yet-familiar Native American face, before reality returned. The Dean-figure looked spent.

"_I draw images from your own mind because projecting images into it is harder. For what I'm about to tell you, your brother's face seemed most appropriate._"

"You're saying you're the one I connected to? The one who stopped the thing the last time it rose?" Sam asked incredulously.

"_Yes. And I don't have much time,_" the representation said somberly. "_Ever since our spell was broken, the magic keeping the creature in check has been weakening._"

"And you've been weakening with it."

"_Yes._"

"What stopped you from coming to me before?"

"_I tried. But you resisted._"

"I what?"

"_Why do you think your visions hurt so much, Sam? Why do they hurt you when Andrew Gallagher's powers didn't, when Max Miller's didn't? Because you resist them. It's why I could only send you visions and dreams._"

"And now, what, I'm not resisting as much?"

"_Because of the disease._" The image smiled and looked off. "_We don't have time for all your questions. I'll make this as plain as I can: your plan won't work. You must spill the blood of the first person whose mind the creature took after the spell was broken and pour it over the altar. Only that will seal it again._"

"How am I supposed to do that? I don't even know who it is! And even if I did, I don't have time to go find him," Sam complained. His head was still aching, but he fastened his satchel strap and threw it over his shoulder. "Not to mention that I'm pretty sure I'm talking to myself here."

Sam began to stalk up the hill. His hallucination followed. Sam spun and put out his hand, an irrational but emphatic motion. The specter was unmoved, but in front of Sam small trees and bushes rustled loudly and bent away from him, and dirt flew as though blown by a powerful wind Sam couldn't feel. His mind screamed again, and he fell to his knees.

"_As I said, it's easier here. There are things about yourself that you're afraid of. You should be afraid of them. But today, you'll have to embrace them to stop something that should scare you even more. That's why—_" The thing stopped midsentence, as though something more powerful had cut it off. Of course, that could just be another convincing detail of a hallucination.

Sam writhed on the ground. By the time he'd managed to get his knees under him, the pain had vanished, and with it whatever had been haunting him.

"Wait!" Sam grunted into the air, only restraining his voice for fear the demon would hear him. "Whose blood do I need?"

No answer came. But he'd moved the dirt and the trees, right? Had that been a hallucination, too? He turned to the nearest shrub and thrust out his arm. Nothing. He focused his mind and tried again. Still nothing.

Sam turned to look up the hill, weighing his options. Even his disease- and drug-addled mind could put together that he had no choice but to go through with Dean's plan. He didn't have enough information to try anything else, and he couldn't trust the information he had. But now, added to the plan's improbability of success, his nagging doubts had been renewed; it was hard not to feel as if they were missing something vital.

* * *

Aphorael watched the young hunter crest the hill and shuffle clumsily through the grass. The demon smiled. This was going to be easier than he'd assumed.

He put out his hand and the young man fell. Gripping him with telekinetic force, the demon dragged him roughly across the open grass and toward the altar. The man-child pulled a gun from his belt and struggled to aim as he skidded across the coarse ground. The boy fired twice and missed. The demon smiled. It was always so much more gratifying when they fought back.

The demon pulled until the hunter was supine at his feet, gasping pleasingly in pain. Aphorael tossed the man's gun away and kneeled down, grasping his victim by the chin to pull their eyes together.

"You cost me quite a great deal, boy," he said, drinking in the fear and anguish in the young man's eyes. "If it were up to me, I'd spend all day…hurting you. But he wants you dead, and quickly."

The boy pulled a knife from his boot and buried it in the demon's chest. It wasn't blessed, but it certainly hurt and Aphorael fell back. The hunter scrambled up and ran for his gun…too late.

The demon grabbed him invisibly and yanked him back around before flinging him against one of the flat altar stones and pinning him there. He held him tightly, squeezing his ribcage and throat painfully. Standing over the boy, he drew the hunter's knife out of his chest and brandished it.

"My child," the former pastor said, coming up to his full height as he wiped the blade off on his tattered robes. "Do you know that you bear the mark of a demon? I wonder what the afterlife holds for things like you."

The little thing looked up at him, pained but defiant, and gasped, "I know what it's got in store for you."

There was a thunderous boom, a flash of horrific pain, and the demon's world went black.

* * *

Having secured the demon with their Key of Solomon bedsheet, Dean helped his brother to his feet.

"How bad?" Dean asked.

"Okay…," Sam said, wincing. "Except for my arm. And my leg. And my ribs, chest, and back. Oh, and my throat's going to hurt for a week. Think you could have waited any longer?"

"No, I think that was good enough. Good distraction as usual, Sammy."

Sam looked over at the demon, who was leaned, seemingly unconscious, against the invisible wall produced by the trap. "Did we actually knock a demon out?"

"Looks like. That must be what happens when you get holy water inside one. Anyway, you should get started on the exorcism. I'll start the dig."

The ground trembled, not violently, but with an ominous rumble. Dean surveyed the horizon and saw low, dark clouds ringing the clear sky above them, closing in from every direction. He looked over at Sam, who was making the same observation.

"Yeah, we should probably move this along," Sam agreed.

* * *

"_Can you believe he really thinks this'll work?_"

Sam gritted his teeth, trying as hard as he could to ignore the image of himself that had materialized just minutes before. He was almost done with the exorcism, the demon howling in agony. The holy water in the slug they'd hit him with had run out a while ago; Sam could tell from the lack of steam. If the demon was in pain, it was because the exorcism was working.

"_I mean, he's actually talking about blowing up some apocalyptic monster with fucking dynamite. If it weren't so pathetic, it'd be hilarious."_

It was hard to keep his train of thought. The ground was shaking harder now, and more frequently. The sky darkened as the clouds drew in.

"In nomino deus omnipotentas, mandam—"

"_Idiot says what?_"

"Mandam fates…" Sam looked down at the book he was holding having lost his place.

"What's wrong?" the demon taunted, gasping. "Trouble concentrating?"

"Shut the hell up."

"_Good comeback, Sammy._" Now it was Dean beside him. "_Not exactly surprised to see you messing up. That's pretty much your M.O. You fuck up and you bitch. That's about it._"

"In nomino deus omnipotentas," Sam restarted.

"Sam, you having trouble over there?" Dean yelled from where he was digging. "Why isn't that thing in hell yet?"

"I'm fine!" Sam shouted in frustration. "Omnipotentas, mandam—"

A much larger, more violent quake shook the earth beneath him. Sam tripped and fell down, dropping the tattered book. Several of the pages, held only by paper clip, went flying. Sam yelped and scrambled to collect them. The demon laughed arrogantly behind him.

"He's not going to let you send me back, hunter."

"_Hey, butterfingers! You ask me, you're lucky Dad never let you play sports._"

Sam dropped to his knees with the pages in his hands, but they weren't numbered and he couldn't remember their order. He shuffled them around, trying to find where he was and what he still had left to read.

"Sammy, you all right? That one was a doozy!"

"Shut up! Just shut up!" Sam yelled, equal parts rage and panic.

"What's going on out there, Sam?" Dean asked surprise in his voice. Sam could hear tools clattering and assumed his brother was dropping what he was doing.

"_Fucking up again. That's really too bad, Sammy, because now it's all going to be on you. This town is toast, maybe this whole state; we're both going to die and it's all your fault._"

"Stop," Sam whispered to himself in a moment of hysteria. It took everything he had to reorder the papers and clip them back together. He stood.

Another quake hit, and this one was even bigger. Sam fell again, this time holding onto the book, but the earth beneath a part of the sheet encircling the demon split, some of the underlying rock jutting sharply upward. The sheet began to tear, and Sam leaped to grab it.

* * *

Dean lifted himself out of the hole to a horrifying sight: his brother on his knees in front of the demon, clawing and scratching fruitlessly at the hand gripping his throat. Dean's hand went to his belt and he drew his .45, but it was out of his grip and in the demon's before he could get off a single shot. An unseen force threw him against the ground and dragged him across the shivering earth to his brother's side.

He climbed to his knees, but the force would let him go no further. He turned to look at Sam, still struggling against the demon's hand. Terror gripped him. They'd been so close, but now he couldn't think of anything to do. The demon released Sam's neck, but by force of will kept both brothers on their knees.

"I've had more than enough of the two of you," the demon seethed, beginning to pace in front of them. Dean tried to sputter a glib reply, but found he couldn't speak. "The only question is, which one of you dies first?"

The brothers' eyes met, and Dean saw in Sam's almost palpable guilt. Unless Dean did something quick, Sam was going to die believing everything was his fault.

"I think the fool who tried to exorcise me should get to see what his failure will cost him," Aphorael said, turning to Sam. "What do you think about that? You get to watch your brother die."


	15. Impulse Control

_Coming down to the end here, people. Finally. Just one more planned after this one, and possibly an epilogue._

_Thanks to all my readers. I hope you find the chapters concluding this story satisfying. Thanks to my reviewers, without whom I never would have had the will to finish this story._

_Finally, thanks to my beta, K. Hanna Korossy. As with every other chapter in this story, the quality of this chapter owes a great deal to her efforts. _

_Enjoy _Chapter 14_,  
_

_Kohadril_

Chapter 14: Impulse Control

Aphorael turned away from Sam and faced Dean, willing him to collapse to the ground in the fetal position. Sam tried to yell, tried to move, but found once again he could not.

His mind was beginning to unhinge; he could feel it. The voices were coming more and more frequently, were getting louder as he kneeled there helplessly.

"_Failed again, Sam. Looks like I was right about you all along,_" John Winchester said, provoking a wince.

"_At least I wasn't the only one,_" Jess added, and Sam tried to force his hands to his head to muffle the sound but still couldn't move. "_Turns out you kill everyone you love._"

"_What the fuck is wrong with you? It was a simple exorcism,_" Dean berated him.

The demon twisted his hand, and the real Dean screamed.

_Dean!_ Sam had to do something, something about this world outside of him that was more than just reference material for his hallucinations to draw from.

"I released his vocal chords so you could hear him. It's so much more satisfying this way, don't you think?" the demon needled.

"_It's too bad it has to end like this. You and I could have had a lot of fun,_" said Sam's duplicate, now standing in front of him.

They surrounded him, the four of them all there at once, all speaking at once, tripping over each other. But Sam could hear every word and inflection. Somehow, he could see their faces, too, even the ones behind him, could feel their expressions, their eyes boring into him. And over the din of their condemnations, Sam could only hear Dean's cries.

Inside of him, things started to fly apart. Even as he sobbed uncontrollably, something was changing, something dark and primal and hot growing in his heart.

Dean screamed again, and Sam's rage grew, flaring like a fire, burning away at his other, less useful emotions. Sam fought it; it threatened to overwhelm him.

However, something, some nagging doubt remaining from his encounter with the Anasazi spirit, finally led him to try a different tactic. Sam focused his rage, and found that he could move his hands, however slightly, in the demon's grip. A surge of hope filled him briefly, but his head felt like it was going to burst. He needed more.

He knew now what the vision had meant. Knew what part of him the spirit had been talking about. The dark part. The demon part. The part staring him in the face right now.

"_That's it, goody-two-shoes. You can still save him. All you need is me,_" the demon-him whispered, distinct from the other voices. Sam dry-heaved from the revulsion. "_Just give it up. Let me in._"

Dean had stopped screaming and was retching now instead. He caught Sam's eyes, briefly, and the world quieted, Sam's prosecutors falling silent. Sam looked back in silent apology, hoping Dean would register it in his eyes. He seemed to, and as the wrenching moment ended, Dean mouthed his response, too pained even to speak. _Not your fault_.

That small gesture, that breathless absolution and pure expression of love, eclipsed Sam's fear. And without his fear, things were so much clearer. The hallucination of himself was a product of the creature's power. How much had it shown him to play on his terror of his special abilities and darker nature? As much as his duplicate had seemed to be trying to tempt him, all it had really done was push him further away, convince him that his powers were evil and would inevitably corrupt him. This thing didn't want him to stop resisting; it wanted him to keep it up.

This thing was afraid of Sam. Afraid of what Sam could do.

The demon stood beside his brother, a look of dark finality on his face, and Dean lay there, tensed as though still fighting, unbowed in the face of death. This was their only chance. Dean's only chance.

Sam let go.

* * *

Aphorael picked up the squirming, struggling hunter by the throat and held him in the air, displaying him so that the younger one could watch every ounce of strength drain from his brother's body. He turned to gauge the boy's reaction.

But something was wrong. Something was fighting against his hold on the younger hunter, threatening to break it. The demon looked on in astonishment as the young man, no longer broken or scared, climbed confidently to his feet, shaking off the demon's magic.

The boy looked him in the eye with cold, unambiguous hate and grinned. Viciously.

"Worst. Pastor. Ever," the boy mocked.

The demon dropped the older one unceremoniously, turning his full might against the adversary in front of him and projecting a powerful telekinetic blast. The boy ducked and rolled, avoiding the attack as though he'd seen it coming. He then picked up a knife from the dirt and threw it in a single fluid move.

The demon roared in pain as the knife buried itself in his chest.

* * *

It still hurt. Sam had tried to completely release control, but there were parts of his consciousness that would not be subsumed. Still, they were abstract now, and distant. And they were not in command.

The demon continued to bellow as it struck again, and again Sam easily avoided harm. Sam's mind strained under the weight of new senses, his perception split between the world of the moment and the world of a few seconds to come. His psychic sight was infinitely improved: everything around him had penumbras and auras, and the forces of the demon's telekinesis were no longer invisible to him. Around the altar, a fading violet energy strained against a rising blackness.

Sam considered all of this only to assess his capabilities, not out of any idle curiosity. These powers were a gift to him now, instruments with which to fulfill a single, consuming desire. Vengeance. His heart pounded but despite the pain, there was a cathartic ecstasy to it, a freedom he'd never felt and hadn't known he was missing. He didn't know what his powers were, didn't understand their limits, but somehow he _felt_ what to do.

"Insolent boy! Do you really think your paltry gifts can match me?"

Sam picked up his brother's .45 in the middle of another roll, and as he brought it up to fire, the world slowed to a crawl. What's more, his target seemed to grow, eventually seeming so large, Sam could aim the gun right at its throat even as he finished his acrobatic movement, and easily put three bullets within the space of an inch before the world sped up again.

"Shut up," Sam snarked with a wicked, toothy smile as the demon, his esophagus destroyed, screamed unintelligibly. The former pastor's eyes flashed to black, and the demon projected a wall of force that, while not particularly powerful, was too wide to dodge. Sam fell backward, dropping the gun, and the demon stalked after him.

By the time Sam had made it to his feet, the demon was there. He threw a wild punch—demons must not be instructed in boxing technique in hell—but it was supernaturally strong and fast: Sam narrowly avoided it, and instinctively threw a counterpunch at his opponent's jaw. The strike hit, Sam's hand hurt, and the demon glared back disdainfully. He caught Sam with a punch to the gut that sent him hurtling back.

Again the demon was on him as he got up, but this time Sam lashed out, giving himself over to his rage. The pain in his head lightened; he was resisting less, and he felt unnatural strength fill him. Sam's thrust-kick to the demon's chest staggered him, and with the opening, Sam launched a flying knee, catching the demon square in the jaw and knocking him over.

The demon looked confused as he hit the ground, and again instinct took over. Sam got on top of his opponent, straddling his chest, and started to pound.

"You know," Sam seethed, punishing his victim with a bone-crushing right, "a demon did this to me once." Sam punched him again. And again. Each time the host's feature's shattered; each time it took longer for them to recover. "It's much more fun being on top."

The demon made another indistinct, guttural noise and heaved unskillfully, which shouldn't have worked except that the demon was absurdly strong. Sam fell off him and instantly stood, backing away as if to get some distance.

* * *

Dean didn't really get what was going on—he'd lost consciousness for a while back there, and he was groggy and having trouble moving—but from what he could see, Sam was standing toe-to-toe with the demon, which didn't seem possible. The kid was moving fast, inhumanly fast, hitting inhumanly hard. Something wasn't right.

He'd worry about that later. The demon's attention was on Sam; maybe Dean could find some way to help. He looked around for weapons. Nothing within easy reach except for a shovel. He reached, a painful exertion, and gripped the handle, dragging the tool over next to him.

"Fucking demons," he muttered to himself as he planted the shovel and used it to climb to his feet.

* * *

This was not what he had foreseen.

True, it was one of several possible futures he'd walked, but it had been so unlikely. The younger hunter should not have been able to see through his hallucination. The messenger had used the boy's greatest fear, had given it gruesome, perfect form; he had let the boy's own mind shape and define it. That he had overcome it was inconceivable.

The messenger could feel his kin awakening, but he worried. Did the hunter know? Did he so much as suspect? The demon should have been powerful enough to stop them, but now the messenger worried. While he needed the first one there, to be bodily consumed as the creature awoke, he could also be used to restore the Anasazi magic.

The messenger tried to dip into the future, but the outcomes were all hazy. For only the second time in its multi-millennial life, it was uncertain.

* * *

"So let me tell you," Sam chided, bringing the stock of the musket across the demon's jaw, "what I've been thinking."

The demon threw a telekinetic punch that grazed Sam's chest and spun him back away. Sam rolled with it and brought the butt of the musket around in a looping motion. It landed with a resounding crack. It seemed like he couldn't miss. And things were starting to make sense.

"Who might the first crazy person be?" Sam smiled.

"You are a fool—" the demon shouted generically, almost boringly. Sam snapped a round kick at the un-pastor's knee and could feel the bones break when it connected. The demon's rant became more of an agonized scream.

"Excuse me, I was talking," Sam complained. "Rude. Anyway, I was thinking that for you to have built up a flock like that, to build up the power to summon things, you had to be in town for a _while_."

The demon lurched forward, its knee regenerating but not yet functional, and Sam dodged another sloppy strike.

"And demons? Usually can't get inside just _anybody_, unless they're really powerful. And at least back then, you were only powerful when people believed in you. When you were starting out here, no one did."

"What is the point of this?" the demon asked incredulously, frustrated to the point of engagement. He tried to mask another punch, but Sam saw it coming a mile off, ducked in, and made the demon pay for it with an uppercut. He grabbed his opponent by the hair and forced him back. This was becoming so easy.

"The point is, you got inside a crazy person. A crazy _preacher_, because you need people to believe in you. Back then, when you first came here, you didn't even know about the loony flu, did you? 'Cause back then, no one was crazy yet, were they?" Sam pulled Aphorael off balance and drilled him with a left hook, spinning the demon around. Sam grabbed him from behind.

"I mean, except for the good pastor. When all those other folks started freaking, I bet you thought you'd lucked out. Hit the demon-summoning jackpot." Sam chuckled arrogantly into the demon's ear, on a roll now. "But in reality? It was the worst luck you've ever had."

* * *

The demon spun back and shoved the boy away. Everything the hunter said was true, but he still didn't see the significance and that frustrated him all the more.

"In a few minutes, that thing is going to come up out of the earth, and you and your brother are going to die," Aphorael growled.

"Oh, no," the boy replied. "You don't get it. _You're_ what I need to stop it."

"What?" the demon demanded sharply. This child—he needed to destroy him. Not for the messenger, not for his mission, but because he simply could not tolerate this pathetic human's continued existence.

The earth shook again. This time it felt like a true earthquake, and a piece of ground jutted forward and up beneath the boy's feet. He tumbled backward, hitting his head. It stunned him.

Aphorael leaped on the opportunity, jumping on top of his quarry, grabbing him by the collar and physically lifting him before bringing him down hard, right on top of the altar's flat center stone. In the demon's haste, he nearly stepped into the hole the other one had been digging, just a few inches to the right.

His opponent's eyes were unfocused, dazed, and the drop had taken the wind out of him. He was helpless, just for a moment, but that was all the Aphorael needed. He raised his fist.

"Hey, Pastor Dumbshit!" he heard from behind him. He turned right into the oncoming backside of the shovel. It did nothing. He grabbed the shovel and telekinetically threw the older boy several yards through the air, where he landed roughly on the ground. Then the demon turned back.

"Surprise!" the younger boy yelled, recovered. He bolted up, planting a hand on Aphorael's chest, and a titanic surge of burning energy poured into the demon. His host's limbs and muscles began to jerk and contract, becoming rigid as though electrified. The boy spun them around, pinning the demon's back to the altar table. And as he lay there, paralyzed and wracked with searing pain, somehow he knew his unnatural life was about to end. In the face of oncoming oblivion, he began to scream.

* * *

Dean sat up just in time to see his brother extend his unoccupied hand into the air, and watched, disbelieving, as Dean's blessed machete, which he'd discarded by the hole he'd been digging, twirled through the air and into Sam's hand. The demon was…freaking out. Smoke was rising from his body, and he was acting like he'd just jammed a fork into an electrical socket.

Sam let go with his restraining hand, only briefly, and the demon's body sagged. Sam put both hands on the machete and raised it.

Suddenly, the black wisps of the demon's true form began to pour forth out of the eyes and mouth of the pastor's body, arcing up into the sky, where they seemed to hover, unsure, unable to disperse or escape.

From the earth, all around the altar, long tendrils, also black but this time filled with flecks of white that seemed like stars, rose up and surrounded the demon's essence, chasing it, sparking where they intersected, slowly obliterating it.

Dean didn't really know, but he suspected the demon had just met his end.

Dean turned and watched his brother pause momentarily as the pastor—who likely didn't have much time in this world, as whatever injuries he'd sustained as a demon were soon to kill him—came to his senses. But Sam didn't alter his grip, and as Dean screamed his protest, his little brother brought the machete down.

* * *

Maybe the creature had thought this would dissuade him, thought he wouldn't take an innocent life, even one that was about to die, to save his brother. And it was true, Sam was having trouble maintaining his focus. His anger was ebbing, his powers weakening, and his head was beginning to scream. Beneath him, a man was crying, bleeding, dying of horrible burns Sam had just inflicted. The man was trying to beg.

Sam was afraid. Afraid that this was the kind of thing one couldn't turn back from: taking an innocent life, especially in the viciously painful way he had to do it to make sure the man's living blood drenched the altar. But he was now more certain than ever. The thing that had been ordering Aphorael around wouldn't have released the demon from the pastor's body if he hadn't wanted to give Sam pause.

He stood there, just a second, but it felt like he'd been waiting an eternity. It wasn't about hate anymore. It wasn't about revenge. He knew that what he had to do was evil, and as much as he wanted to believe he was doing this to protect civilization, he had to admit something to himself.

He was doing this for his family. Like the Anasazi before him.

He brought the blade down, and rent the man's belly from waist to shoulder. The pastor made a horrible noise—half-gurgle, half-scream—as his life came to its final, awful end.

As the blood spilled over the altar, Sam glanced up and caught an indistinct face glaring at him with black, star-filled eyes. Horror gripped him, reality splintered, and he fell to the ground.

* * *

As the blood covered the altar, a hum filled the air, purple-white energy wafting up around it, encircling the starry black tentacles and forcing them back down into the earth. The quakes stopped, but everything seemed to vibrate, as though a charge was running through the air. As Dean watched, the purple energy gathered, having dispersed the black, and shot skyward in a titanic blast from the center of the altar, boring a hole through the black clouds that had closed above them.

With a deafening clap, the energy exploded outward in all directions. Then it was over. The sky was clear. The earth was still. The creature, Dean presumed, slept once more.

Then he saw Sam. He hadn't seen the kid fall, but there he was, on the ground. Dean climbed to his feet as quickly as he was able, and limped over to him.

He grabbed his brother's lapels and pulled him up, propping him against the altar in a sitting position. Sam's eyes were open, he was breathing, but something was wrong.

"Sam? Sammy?" Dean said, looking intently into his brother's eyes. Sam didn't make eye contact. He wasn't avoiding it, though; he just looked straight through his brother.

"I'm not," Sam said, and though it came out in a whisper, Dean got the sense Sam wasn't talking to him. "I'm…smarter than them. They think they can fool me, but I know. They're watching, but they'll never see it. I promise they'll never see it."

Dean's heart leaped into his throat, his eyes filling. "No," he croaked. He shook his brother lightly and pulled their faces together. "Come on, man, look at me."

Sam provided no resistance, but he didn't comply. "They want my soul. I know they want to get inside me to get it," Sam muttered incomprehensibly.

"No, this isn't fair!" Dean shouted in agony, looking past his brother at the altar before glaring up at the open sky. "We stopped the monster—give him back to me!"

Sam's face contorted painfully. "They're going to get it, too. I can't stop them forever."

Dean waited for something, for any kind of response from the universe. He got nothing.

He put his hand on his brother's cheek. "Don't worry, Sam. Just keep fighting. You're going to get better," he said, but he knew it was more for himself than for Sam. Sam just stared straight ahead, traces of emotion crossing his face, a kind of quiet, unremitting pain in his eyes.

Dean's will gave out. The hope that Sam could still get better seemed distant and faint, and it was crushed under the weight of Dean's failure. It didn't matter that he was just a human being, and that what had happened here was beyond his ability to even understand. The math was simple: Sam was crazy, so Dean had failed.

Instinct took over. He reached out, hugged his brother tightly, and began to sob.


	16. Communication

_My personal computer doesn't work, so I had write the first draft of this out longhand and transfer it to my work computer manually. Awesome. This chapter is another mega-multi-rewrite, but I think the final version (after like ten personal drafts and three separate beta-reviewed drafts) is pretty good. I hope you agree._

_Thanks to all my reviewers; your encouragement and dedication is what's given me the will to see this through, despite all the changes (good changes, but still difficult ones) in my life._

_Before any of you complain that this is the last chapter, there WILL be an epilogue; I didn't close everything up neatly like I prefer to in this chapter._

_Thanks especially to K. Hanna Korossy. She now knows this chapter almost as well as I do, which is to say she could probably recite half of it by heart. I went through three separate draft-stages with her on this, and she was patient with me throughout. She is a great beta and a great writer._

_Disclaim, disclaim disclaim._

_With that, _Chapter 15

_Enjoy,_

_Kohadril_

Chapter 15: Communication

Dean sat slumped in the off-blue upholstered chair by the foot of his brother's hospital bed. His head hanging, he stared vacantly at his knees.

He'd been sitting there for about thirty minutes. The last few days he'd spent most of his time there, but for three hours that morning he'd been out, taking care of some things.

Sam was asleep. With the quantity of drugs he was on, he slept a lot. It was better this way; Dean could pretend Sam was okay. Meaningless muttering, bouts of random terror, total lack of awareness of what was around him: that hurt like hell to see. Of course, the restraints on Sam's wrists and ankles kind of ruined the effect.

Dean looked up and watched Sam's chest rise and fall slowly a couple of times. Sam let out a moan and started to struggle against his restraints, but he didn't wake. Dean reached out and grabbed Sam's right foot, the nearest piece of his body not covered by the blanket, hoping the physical contact might calm him.

"You're okay," Dean whispered, gently rubbing the smooth skin of Sam's sole. Sam seemed to settle down. Dean wanted to believe it was a reaction to him, but at that moment, it wasn't enough. Even after Sam had quieted, Dean felt empty. He needed more than that from his brother, even if he had no reason to expect it. He needed recognition.

Dean ran his thumbnail underneath the ball of his brother's foot and watched Sam curl his toes. He knew it was a reflex, but it was also communication of a kind. That little flex was an acknowledgment, however unconscious and involuntary, that Dean existed.

Dean's heart ached. It was more than he ever got when Sam was awake.

He let his eyes lose focus, relaxing his grip without letting go completely. He wondered how long it had been since he'd really slept.

His mind wandered, taking him back a few hours to a scene he didn't want to revisit. He shuddered and shook his head, trying to pull himself out of his thoughts, if only for a few more minutes. But there it was, right in front of him, and he couldn't ignore it any longer. He barely kept the tears out of his eyes. Whether his brother could hear him or not, Dean needed to talk.

"Sam," Dean started quietly, in a rough, excruciated voice. "I think I just did something really bad."

* * *

Something was wrong. The young woman had been shrieking and glancing around the room in horror intermittently for over five minutes now. It wasn't uncommon for patients to get excited like this, but episodes didn't last this long.

Ben Matthews shook his head, trying to force his brain to function. He knew he should be doing something; he shouldn't just be sitting here by this woman's bed, watching her suffer. The truth was, the doctor was barely hanging on. It had been weeks since he'd slept well. He needed an answer to what was going on here, and he'd reached the limits of the available research. Now he spent his workdays observing patients, hoping something would come to him.

His mind slid back into gear. The room was still filled with terrified sounds, the woman shaking her bed as she battled her restraints. What to do? Medication, right. Matthews stood slowly, almost ignorant of the woman's struggles, and grabbed her chart from the wall. He blinked tiredly and perused the record.

It took a moment for him to see it, but then he did. This woman's resident, a Dr. Brandt, had messed up. He hadn't given her any antipsychotic medication in just under two days.

Matthews instantly snapped back to full awareness and looked directly into the face of the woman he'd been watching.

She was clearly insane. She was also clearly staring right back at him, incoherent but aware.

* * *

"Washington says he's sorry," Dean said evenly, trying, as though Sam could hear him, as though it would matter if he could, to keep the pain and uncertainty out of his voice. "He didn't want to, at first. I changed his mind." Dean stifled a shudder. "It took him a couple of tries to convince me he meant it."

Of course Sam didn't respond. He was asleep, and even were he awake, he wouldn't register any of this. But this was still a confession, and Dean was almost worried about what his brother might think.

"There's a good reason for you to get better," Dean observed with a cheerless smirk, his voice raw. "Without your bitch-boy morality lectures, I can get pretty dark."

Dean let go of Sam and looked down, putting his hands in his lap.

"I killed him, man. And it wasn't self-defense. It wasn't even about stopping him from trying another apocalypse," Dean continued. "I've got his journal. Found it under the floorboards of his compound after the cops swept the place. Turns out that trick he pulled won't work again for another two hundred years. And I didn't just find that out. I had the book before I found him—it's how I found him, actually."

Dean was having trouble controlling his demeanor.

"He deserved it," Dean defended, as though his brother were arguing with him. "What he did to all those people, what he did to you…I didn't make it easy on him, but he fucking deserved what he got and more, and I'm not sorry—"

Dean's voice gave out. He tried to swallow the lump growing in his throat.

"So why does it feel like this?" he managed, the guilt and shame flowing over into his voice. "And how do I make it stop?"

* * *

"Mrs. Desmond? It's Dr. Matthews from the hospital." Matthews braced for the yelling that almost immediately ensued. "No, ma'am, I'm not trying to convince you to bring your daughter in. I just want to know—ma'am?"

Matthews sighed deeply and waited for an opening. It took a little while.

"Ma'am, are you done?" Matthews asked, provoking another fifteen seconds of ranting. He decided to interrupt before the inevitable hang-up. "Mrs. Desmond, all I need to know is if there has been any change in your daughter's condition in the last three days."

The silence that followed was an excellent sign. Then the woman answered a breathless affirmative.

"Ma'am, I'm not going to ask you to bring her here, but would you mind if I came out to see her? You're still in town, aren't you?"

The expected questions came.

"We have another patient here who's had a change in condition, and I need to know why." The doctor smiled in relief as he got the answer he was looking for. "Thank you very much, Mrs. Desmond, I'll see you in about twenty minutes."

* * *

"I'm sorry. I didn't know how you felt," Dean said. The words were heavy, but being able to say them, here in Sam's presence, was liberating. "I mean, I knew you weren't okay, but if it weren't for…"

Dean took a shallow breath. "You're not worthless. You're not a wimp. You're not weak. I'd take back every time I ever beat you at anything, every time I ever made fun of you, if I could just convince you."

Dean could imagine Sam's denial. In fact, he could almost hear it.

"You think I'm some kind of hero, Sam, but you don't understand where it comes from." He couldn't believe he was saying this. He couldn't believe he never had before now.

"Before you, I was a normal kid. I wasn't strong. I cried a lot. Dad told me I was a whiny little bitch.

"But holding you that night, after the fire…I changed. Dad said he could count on one hand the number of times he saw me cry after that.

"When I was seven or eight, Dad started talking about how I had to take care of you, how it was my responsibility as much as his. He didn't have to say any of it, though. I got it. I had to be strong for my little brother. By then, I'd known it for years.

"It helped me when I was scared, knowing that you needed me to be brave. It helped me work hard, too—I don't have your nerdy discipline. I hated school and I can't sit still. But anything Dad could teach me, anything that could help me look out for you, I'd practice for hours without getting bored. And yeah, I've got good instincts. I'm a hell of a fighter, hell of a shooter. Some stuff just comes easy.

"But the point is, you're the secret, Sam. When you left, I spent three years just going through the motions. You can't ask him now, but if you'd asked Dad how I was then...

"I know it seems like nothing gets to me, but I'm only like that because you're here. Because somebody has to take care of you, and a scared, stupid, self-hating wreck isn't going to get the job done."

Dean looked up into his brother's face, noting once more how misleadingly normal he looked when he was asleep. Dean shook his head, blinking away the moisture blurring his vision.

"So if you're thinking about leaving me again, thinking maybe I'm tough enough to survive it, I'm not. You're what _makes_ me strong. Girly as it sounds, I really do need you, bro."

* * *

The Desmond girl was much the same as the first woman. Four calls to the families of victims who had left the city yielded only one more patient who had been taken off the antipsychotics, but that one, a young boy, had also apparently changed considerably in the last three days. Of course, Matthews couldn't personally examine him, but this was a pattern that couldn't be denied.

How was he was going to get anyone to allow him to do a therapeutic trial? No one would want to take their loved ones off medication, particularly given how horrible the early stages of remission—if indeed that's what it was—appeared to be. Additionally, Matthews had no understanding of the causal mechanism between taking the patients off the drugs and the change in their condition. Without that, it would take far more evidence than he had to convince the hospital administration to let him do anything.

Then he remembered: he had at least one patient whose family was unlikely to be hung up on bureaucratic procedure or medical ethics.

* * *

"I never told you—I never tell you anything. I never fucking told you why I'm so sure you won't turn," Dean forced out, no longer able to maintain his composure and no longer caring.

"There's something inside you, Sammy—it's been there as long as I can remember. The things we see, the things we do, they still get to you, after all these years. Even after everything that's happened to our family, to you, you've still got some kind of faith that all the evil stuff out there is what's unnatural, and that things are supposed to be good."

"I know you won't turn because I haven't turned yet. You're a good man, bro. The best I know. And if I haven't gone dark, you sure as hell won't.

"I need that now," Dean continued quietly. "I need you to give me some hope, 'cause I'm fresh out of it here. I'm not ready to…do what you wanted me to, even if I know you're in pain. But if I get there sometime soon, the only way I can picture it happening involves two bullets: one for you, one for me. So we're clear, Sammy? If I outlive you, it won't be for very long."

With that, Dean felt he had said enough; however dark things still were, he had released enough to avoid being overwhelmed. Perhaps even enough to get a few hours of rest. He lay back in the chair and closed his eyes.

He was almost asleep when a knock at the door jostled him back to full alertness.

"Mr. Winchester?"

"Yeah," Dean growled, his voice rough from exhaustion. He ran a hand heavily through his hair, more to clear his head than anything else, and turned in his seat to face the voice.

"Do you mind if I come in?" Dr. Matthews continued, looking as spent as Dean felt.

"No. But if we're gonna talk, I'd rather do it in the hall. Don't want to wake him up," Dean said, thrusting a thumb at his brother.

The pair quietly retreated from the room, Dean pausing before he shut the door behind him. He gave his sleeping brother a final look, and couldn't help doubt that Sam would ever look like this—like the brother he knew—again when he was awake.

* * *

The hardest part was the waiting. The first twenty-four hours there was no change. Sam slept less, but he wasn't any more aware. It hurt to watch, but Dean couldn't turn away; he had nowhere else to be, and the doctor made sure they weren't bothered by nurses or other hospital staff.

It was almost like a fever that had to be allowed to build so it would eventually break. Sam's delusions and hallucinations became more and more powerful, more and more commanding, but also more and more immediate.

In the second twenty-four hours, things started to happen. Sam noticed his restraints first. Whereas before he had struggled against them absently, unaware of what was stopping him, now they became an obvious focus of his attentions. He pulled against them, fought them, ripped them off the bed. Stronger restraints were quickly required; Dean had to hold his brother down for them to be applied. No medications were administered, though, for fear of relapse.

Sam made eye contact, several times. He didn't seem to recognize Dean, but he appeared to know Dean was a person, an entity other than himself. That was a start. During that long second day, a horrible kind of progress was made. Every new milestone was reached after fresh hardships and painful glimpses for Dean into his brother's damaged psyche.

Yet for all its intensity, for all its difficulty, it was a thousand times better than watching nothing at all.

* * *

Not for the first time that week, Dean awoke from a brief nap to the sound of his brother stirring.

He was slow to react. He'd been down this road many times over the last few days. If Sam was going to go ape-shit, the restraints would hold him; the new ones were pretty unbreakable. Dean would do his best to calm his brother down, like he always did, and get maybe a few seconds of combative eye contact for his efforts.

No sounds came out of Sam, which made Dean finally look up. It was rare enough these days that Sam didn't freak out at least for a while after waking.

Sam was shaking. Shaking and looking right at him. There was fear and confusion in his eyes, but also a glimmer of real recognition.

Dean was speechless, overwhelmed. The chair was near the middle of the bed, so he grabbed his brother's hand—it was the only thing he could think to do.

"Sam? Sammy?"

The moment of silence couldn't have been more than a few seconds. It felt much longer. Sam looked like he was going to speak a few times before he actually did; there were tears in his eyes, and he jolted once as though in reaction to something Dean couldn't see or hear.

"Dean?" he eventually said, tentative and suspicious, like he expected something horrible to happen.

Dean practically choked on a laugh, a wave of euphoria going through him. He squeezed his brother's hand a little more tightly and looked him in the eye. "Yeah, it's me, bro," he replied with a hopeful smile.

"They've—they've got me tied down," Sam said questioningly, tugging on his restraints. "I don't know where—er—what...but they're…"

Sam looked at Dean with the kind of anguished frustration that could only build. He jerked on his restraints again, this time much harder, and when he still couldn't move, he started to freak out, eyes darting around the room fearfully as though he expected attack, terrified it would come while he was bound and helpless. He was hallucinating, even if it looked like he was beginning to be able to tell what was real and what wasn't, working himself into a tearful panic.

"Sam, stay with me," Dean pleaded. This was not the Dean who had battled for Sam's sanity the week before; this Dean was out of fuel, spent, hysterical as he felt his brother slipping away again, even if only for a time. With his free hand, he grabbed Sam's shoulder, as if to keep him from escaping.

Somehow the kid's thrashing slowed, his brow furrowed. Sam was fighting. Fighting like he hadn't been able to just moments before. With titanic effort, he brought his grey-green eyes back to Dean's and kept them there, every second a battle to maintain his focus.

One moment, Sam had been spiraling towards insanity. The next, he was battling it. Dean's need, not his strength, had made the difference.

All at once, Dean knew what had happened that day at the altar. Sam hadn't lost control. He hadn't crossed that line for himself, either, nor for strangers. He hadn't turned until the demon had started working on Dean. Sam had sacrificed his conscience, given up his identity, risked his _soul_, for his brother.

Sam loved him as much as he loved Sam. All those times he'd said he'd do anything, he'd meant it.

And if Sam loved him that much? That meant Dean was worth more than he gave himself credit for, more than just the measure of what he gave to others. It meant his own wellbeing mattered. Their father had died, and Dean had slipped into life as a nothing, a no one; it had been so much easier than living with himself. Maybe it had even helped, for a time. But right now, in this place, Dean resolved to remember who he was, for his own sake as well as his brother's.

Sam's concentration wavered, his eyes coming off Dean's for just a moment. His little brother was losing the battle with his broken mind, and would probably lose many more as he recovered. Dean couldn't imagine how hard that would be, but a kid—a _man_ as strong as Sam would survive it; of that Dean had no doubt. And to the extent it was possible, Sam wouldn't be fighting alone.

Sam strained to reclaim his focus, but when he succeeded, his emotions started to get the better of him. It all began to unravel: Sam's strength deserted him, the terror he'd been holding at bay flooding in. His eyes conveyed aching weakness, shame, dread as he lost the will to stand on his own. He started to panic again, and he turned to his brother.

"I'm scared," the kid whispered tearfully, admitting defeat, begging for help. It was as honest a statement as either of them had ever made.

Dean leaned in. He found he knew what he needed to say. "Do you trust me?" he asked with a reassuring smile.

Sam didn't speak; his tears didn't stop. But when he nodded, he did so with certainty.

Dean squeezed Sam's hand and shoulder affectionately. "Then don't worry, man. I'm here. Nothing bad is going to happen to you."


	17. Epilogue

_First off, disclaimer: I don't own the universe I'm writing in. Scandalous!_

_Second: Thanks to all my reviewers. You've been my inspiration throughout this story. As I write this, I note that it has been exactly one year since I posted the prologue. That's a long time to wait for updates from a story like this—that you guys have stayed with me all this time is gratifying and flattering._

_Third: Thanks to my betas, Wolfschild and especially K. Hanna Korossy. You're wonderful, K. We've never met in person, but I consider you a great friend._

_So, I don't know if epilogues are supposed to be like this, but this one ended up being the longest chapter in the story. Apparently I still had a few things left to say._

Epilogue

They faced each other across the wrestling mat, tentative, neither interested in making the first move. There were no words, the mirror-walled room silent except for their breathing and the sticky sounds of their footfalls.

It was good they were here, Sam acknowledged, even if he was a little uncomfortable with the whole trespassing thing. Sure, the gym was closed and no one was using it, but this was somebody's property and they hadn't been invited. Dean's argument that no one would catch them at 4:00 a.m. on a Monday didn't change that. But they badly needed to train, and this was a victimless crime, so after Dean had called him a pussy a few times, Sam had agreed.

Dean stepped in quickly. Sam backed out and away, circling clockwise around his brother. Dean pulled back, keeping the distance. They reset their positions. Nothing gained, nothing lost. A halfhearted attack, a passive defense, a quick withdrawal. This was getting ridiculous. Sam had forced Dean to submit twice already today; his older brother wasn't on his game.

Sam was recovering well, or as well as he had any reason to expect. He hadn't heard anything out of the ordinary in a week, hadn't seen anything in almost twice that. But he was still a little edgy, still prone to mood swings, still battled the occasional delusional thought…like the impression, unjustified but powerful, that he was guilty of something terrible, that sometime recently he'd crossed a fatal line.

That he couldn't remember anything like that wasn't comforting: Sam's memory was maddeningly fuzzy. Between Dean choking him out at Kidney Dude's house and his first noticing Dean by his hospital bed just over two weeks ago, there were a lot of gaps. Most of what he did remember was from early in the hunt; the closer he got to that day on the hill, the less he could recall. He had a few moments of their conversation in the car, before they'd put the plan in motion, but after that he was completely blank until he'd started to recover.

Dean had told him what they'd done, how they'd done it. Told him how Sam's visions had been useful, that they'd figured out at the last minute that gutting the trapped demon on top of the altar would seal things back up.

It didn't sound right. He didn't think Dean was lying, but he couldn't shake the feeling there was something he wasn't being told. He figured this was normal, though. This must be how it felt to lose one's memory, to have an incomplete picture of important past events. Dean could tell him everything, in explicit detail, and it probably still wouldn't feel right; as long as he didn't remember, something would still be missing.

Yet for all of that, Sam felt good. Things were looking up. He wouldn't have been there if he hadn't felt up to it.

Dean stopped, his muscles tensed. Sam could see it coming. Dean shot in, going for his legs. Sam sprawled instinctively, throwing his legs back behind him and dropping his hips toward the mat, landing on top of his brother and denying him the takedown.

"I know you're out of practice," Sam said, looping his right arm under Dean's chin and grabbing his right triceps. "But I've never seen you telegraph a double-leg that badly."

"So you've got a headlock," Dean gritted. "This isn't high school wrestling, dude—that's not a submission."

Sam pulled Dean's triceps in tight against his brother's neck as Dean fought to back out. Too late, Sam was in too deep. He locked his left elbow against Dean's trapped arm and changed his right-hand grip to his own left biceps. His left hand latched onto Dean's back near his right shoulder.

"No, but this is," Sam said, rolling over his left shoulder to his back, walking his body around toward Dean's and squeezing. Dean struggled for a minute, then slapped the mat three times with his left hand to submit to the choke. Sam released; Dean sat up, facing away from him, and coughed. Sam watched the back of his brother's head.

"Good one, Sam," Dean said casually. "I didn't see that coming."

Sam wasn't buying any of this. "You taught me that move," he replied. "It's one of your favorites."

Dean turned his head, looking at Sam out of the corner of his eye. "Like you said, out of practice," he replied unconvincingly.

"Right." Sam knew he should try to be patient with this, try to take Dean's feelings into account, but he didn't like being coddled, and that was exactly what was going on here.

"You got something you wanna say to me?" Dean asked, suddenly annoyed.

"Yeah," Sam said calmly. They were here right now, doing something normal, because that's what both of them needed. Dean had some stuff to work out, too, and that wouldn't happen as long as he was holding himself back. "Stop going easy on me."

"I'm not."

"I've made you tap three times in the last twenty minutes. That's as many times as I've gotten you in the last six months," Sam said matter-of-factly.

"You know off the top of your head how many times you've tapped me out in the last six months?"

"Dude, I've spent my whole life getting my ass kicked by you. I remember every time I ever beat you at anything," Sam admitted with a vulnerable smirk. He'd hoped that would lighten the moment. It didn't. He noticed the barest trace of a grimace as Dean turned back to the wall. "That's what this is about, isn't it?" Sam realized empathetically.

"Sam, just leave it alone," Dean said, his voice flat and cold. Sam didn't even register how pained his brother sounded until he'd already responded.

"You're a dumbass," Sam said bluntly. "The stuff I saw, heard…it was a supernatural disease. That's all it was."

Dean stood up and turned around, looking down at his brother with an expression Sam remembered seeing before. It was the expression he'd worn when he'd told Sam about the first time their family had encountered the Shtriga, when Dean had made a mistake that had nearly gotten Sam killed. Guilt and self-directed anger. This time, though, the latter was more intense.

"Right, that's all it was," Dean repeated sarcastically. "So you're telling me those feelings weren't real? That you don't ever feel weak or helpless? You don't ever think that maybe you're not strong enough to control yourself? 'Cause I've heard all of that from you before, Sam. This isn't new. The only difference is that I finally get why you feel that way."

"Dean—" Sam protested, a small lump beginning to form in his throat. While Dean had been taking care of him, clearly he hadn't been taking very good care of himself.

Dean cut him off. "What do you want me to do? Pretend it never happened? Pretend that the voice in your head that sounded like me _didn't_ say you sucked and always would? After all this shit, I'm just supposed to go back to trying to embarrass you on the mat every time we roll? If there's one good thing that came from this disease, it's that now I know how badly I fucked you up. I'm not going to do it again."

"You didn't fuck me up, Dean!" Sam fairly roared, his own anger flaring as he shot to his feet. "Dad treating us like soldiers, that fucked me up because I'm bad at being a soldier. Dad criticizing me constantly, even when I thought I was doing pretty well, that fucked me up because it made me think I couldn't do anything right. Mom, Jess, Dad dying because of this demon that's connected to me, that all fucked me up. So, yeah, I'm hurt. Yeah, sometimes I think I suck pretty hard. But you didn't do any of it."

"I beat you at everything, I called you names—"

"You're my big brother, asshole! That's what you're supposed to do! Dad's the one who dropped the ball, Dad's the one whose job it was to make us think he loved us the same. Moving from town to town, no friends for more than a couple of months—you were the one normal thing in my life. An annoying, cocky, overprotective jerk for an older bro."

"So you're saying…what, you liked losing to me?" Dean asked sarcastically.

This time the truth was all Sam had. "I hated it. Of course I did. But it didn't break me down, not like with Dad. You weren't disappointed in me. You expected me to get better, yeah, but you also expected you'd always beat me. You trained hard to stay ahead, and when we went at it, you didn't hold back. Even if I didn't have a lot of wins, at least I knew you took me seriously."

Sam paused, because he needed to be absolutely sure Dean heard what he was about to say next.

"The only times I doubted that? When every once in a while you'd let me win so I'd feel better, or get the extra fucking cookie or a pat on the head from Dad," Sam seethed. "I know you thought you were helping, but knowing that my brother—the one guy who respected me—thought he had to roll over for me? That _did_ make me feel weak. And it still does."

Dean was taken aback, eyes almost comically wide.

But neither of them could hold their anger. Another few seconds brought a pervading sense of weirdness.

"Huh," Dean mused.

"Yeah," Sam said uncomfortably, watching Dean's face. He could see a smile tugging at his brother's lips.

"So I guess I played that one wrong, then," Dean said with an embarrassed chuckle. The tension seemed to completely drain from the room.

"No shit," Sam said, unable to keep a smirk off his face as the relief washed over him.

Dean turned to him with a mischievous look. "So, you really want me to kick your ass now?"

"I want you to try," Sam said with a grin.

* * *

They circled each other again, and although things certainly felt better, the larger issue was unresolved. Dean didn't know what to do for his brother.

It wasn't that he had done nothing, it was just that most of what he'd done had been negative: things he hadn't said, things he intended to say when Sam was ready. When he'd realized Sam didn't remember, it had been a gift. The kid was vulnerable, hurt, and while he was much better now, he wasn't out of the woods. He didn't need to know, shouldn't have to know, what he'd done to save his brother. Not yet, anyway.

What had just happened made it hard for Dean to continue pretending this was just for Sam's sake. He knew what Sam's reaction would be, how he'd turn what he'd done into something horrible. Make what Dean saw as an act of love into an act of evil. He wasn't ready for that argument. How was he supposed to explain that he was proud of and grateful for what his brother would see as his closest brush with darkness?

Dean wasn't hiding the truth. He was hiding the facts, because the story Sam would see in those facts was wrong.

Everything else was falling into place, though. Sam really was getting better; that he'd recognized Dean was laying off him showed how much better. Dr. Matthews had let them off the hook, too. He'd put together that they'd done something to fix things. No wonder, what with them coming into the hospital, both beaten to hell, Sam completely insane, the same day he'd stopped getting new patients. After the "diagnostic trial" with Sam, Matthews had gotten the all-clear from a bunch of other loved ones to try the same thing. By now, virtually all of the patients were recovering. Turns out, that was all that mattered to the doctor; as much as he'd wanted to know what they'd done, he didn't ask. He was a good man.

Sam must have noticed Dean was lost in thought, because he stepped in quickly, shooting for Dean's front leg. This time Dean sprawled, and there was a scramble in which Dean ended up on top, with Sam on his back. Sam tried to get his legs around Dean to achieve the guard position to limit Dean's offensive options, but he only managed to trap Dean's left leg, ending up in the less advantageous half-guard.

"That probably didn't end up like you planned," Dean mocked, overcoming some minor reticence and falling right back into the role of cocky older brother. He slid his right arm in behind Sam's neck "Not a bad try, though. If it weren't for my catlike reflexes, you might have gotten that takedown."

"Shut up," Sam gritted from beneath him, gripping Dean's trapped leg tightly as he tried to work his way up to his side where he could improve his position.

Dean knew it was coming, waited for it. As he jostled and pushed, Sam's right elbow briefly came off his side. Dean shot his left arm into the gap and snaked his hand up behind his brother's shoulder. With his right arm hooking the neck and his left controlling the shoulder, he clasped his hands and pushed his hips down and forward into Sam, flattening him out, undoing all his work to get to his side.

"Fuck!" Sam whispered harshly as Dean's weight forced much of the air out of his lungs.

"That's what you get for leaving your elbow out like—"

"I know!" Sam bitched frustratedly. The sound was…oddly comforting. How many times had Sam's voice sounded just like that after he'd made exactly that mistake? Normalcy reasserted itself in odd ways.

Sam started to buck and jerk, something Dean had always counseled him not to do from this position. With neck and shoulder control, Dean could hold Sam as long as he wanted while he worked to free his leg; Sam's exertions were pretty much worthless. It would be better to wait until Dean tried to mount him or pin him from the side, then to try to escape from there. But Sam hated to be held down and always seemed to think he could get somewhere with this.

"Waste-d en-er-gy," Dean sing-songed, tightening his grip on Sam and just maintaining position, wearing his brother down. If he were still playing nice, he'd just pull his leg out already. But since he wasn't, he was going to let Sam continue to exhaust himself. It didn't take long; about half a minute later the younger man was already beginning to tire. Sam had great conditioning, as good as or better than Dean's, but being on the bottom, in this position, was much harder than being on top. Another few seconds, and Sam's grip on Dean's leg was noticeably weaker. Dean pulled it out lazily and went to a cross-body pin. He maintained control of the shoulder and neck.

"Was it worth it?" Dean asked, speaking almost directly into Sam's ear. After all, Sam's efforts hadn't stopped him from getting here.

"Fuck you," Sam replied, trying to buck him again as Dean was still shifting his weight. Dean reacted quickly, sliding his left knee over Sam's body and mounting him. He freed his left arm from under Sam's armpit and put his forearm across his brother's throat, gripping Sam's left shoulder to lock it in place. With Sam's neck caught between his arms, he pushed his left elbow toward the mat and pulled his right elbow toward the sky.

Sam resisted stubbornly, like the little brother he was, but after a few seconds tapped his brother's side in surrender.

Dean released Sam, got off his brother, and sat down beside him on the mat. Sam coughed a couple of times.

"Choked from the mount. Pretty embarrassing," Dean taunted as Sam got to his feet.

"Get your ass up, we're going again."

* * *

Sam lay spread-eagle on the mat, his sweat-drenched shirt balled up in one outstretched hand, huffing and puffing like he'd just finished a marathon, consciously trying to spread himself out as much as possible so as to cool off more quickly. His whole body ached already, even though his muscles were still warm. The rest of the day was going to suck.

Dean came back from the front of the gym where they'd left their bags, carrying their water bottles. He sat down next to Sam—plopped down, actually; Sam recognized with some satisfaction that Dean looked pretty wrecked himself—and handed Sam one of the containers.

"You okay?" Dean asked. Sam wasn't looking at his brother's face, but he could see the grin.

"Everything but my pride," Sam lamented, and he wasn't entirely joking. He was embarrassed. He was even a little angry. But he knew, from recent experience, all the different varieties of embarrassment and anger. What he was feeling now was healthy, appropriate, untainted by self-doubt and hatred. He was embarrassed and angry because Dean had schooled him yet again; it was familiar, it was right. He was also elated, happy that Dean had gotten to let go a little bit and have some fun. And, as poorly as he'd fared, Sam had to admit he'd had some fun, too.

None of which meant he didn't want to break Dean's smug, smirking face. He'd just have to wait until he could once again move under his own power to try.

"Seven in a row. That's impressive even for me," Dean said.

"Eight," Sam corrected with a self-conscious wince, "it was eight."

"But who's counting," Dean said with a chuckle. Then he paused, and Sam looked up at him, just in time to catch his older brother's eyes as they scanned his face. The grin was there, like he'd known it would be, but there was something more to it. Before Sam could figure it out, though, Dean gave it away. "The way you kept getting up, though? You are one tough S.O.B."

"It's because I freakin' hate you," Sam groaned.

"Love you too, big guy," Dean said, slapping his hand against Sam's bare chest hard enough to leave a mark. It stung like hell, and Sam's yelp was pretty undignified.

"What was that for, jerk?" Sam whined, bringing his arms in protectively and rolling away onto his side, too exhausted to do anything further about it.

"Didn't know I needed a reason, bitch," Dean replied with an intolerable amount of glee.

* * *

"Dean!"

The sound of Sam calling his name and pounding on the passenger side window pulled him out of his thoughts. He looked up at Sam, shook his head, and quickly reached across the empty seat to unlock the door.

Sam dropped in beside him, wincing a little. Dean was glad he wasn't the only one who was sore; in fact, Sam probably had the worst of it. Still, the kid had volunteered to go get the food. He'd even told Dean to stay in the car while he did. He was asserting his independence, a good sign.

"Why'd you lock the door?" Sam asked, pulling his door closed and resting the bag of burgers on his lap.

"Don't want just anybody getting in," Dean answered absently. He'd meant it to sound like a joke; it hadn't.

"You all right?"

"Yeah," Dean deflected. "My order better be right."

"Hey, if it isn't, it's not my fault," Sam defended. Dean didn't even notice the pause that followed until Sam ended it. "Aren't we…going home now?"

"Right," Dean said, reaching for the ignition before realizing the car was already going. There was no way Sam didn't notice. Dean managed to put the car in gear and get them back out onto the main road, bizarrely without any more questioning from his brother. He guessed the kid had his own stuff on his mind.

"You look guilty as hell," Sam said bluntly after a long silence, catching Dean off guard. He'd thought he was in the clear.

"No, I don't," Dean replied with as much incredulity as he could manage.

"It's all over your face," Sam continued, his voice betraying annoyance. "And like I told you at the gym, I'm fine. You can stop worrying."

"You know what, Sam? It's not always about you!" Dean spat, suddenly angry. It only took a split second for him to realize the many ways in which that was exactly the wrong thing to say.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Sam turn to look at him. Dean kept his eyes on the road and thought about how he could salvage this. Nothing immediately came to mind.

"Ouch," Sam finally said, stunned and at least a little hurt. "Okay, sorry for being so self-centered."

"Sammy…" Dean started, because that wasn't what he'd meant at all. But there was no way to explain that without telling Sam what he did mean.

The car was quiet again. Dean didn't know whether to be relieved or worried.

"So, what is it about?" Sam asked quietly, breaking the silence once more.

"What?" Dean pretended.

"If it's not about me, what is it about?"

"There's nothing, Sam," Dean replied, his own voice betraying him as it cracked under the strain of yet another painful lie.

"Don't bullshit me, Dean."

Something was wrong; something was damaged. Like a piece of shrapnel from a past battle, one he'd never realized was there, something was ripping him apart from the inside. He didn't get it, he just didn't get it; it shouldn't have been like this. He'd ignored it this long, hidden it, but now that he was actually facing the question, he found he couldn't lie anymore.

Dean jerked the car off the road and onto the dirt shoulder and stopped. He gripped the wheel tightly, turned to his brother, and glared. He was angry, furious even, but he still couldn't think of anything to say but the truth.

Sam looked at him with empathy he didn't deserve. Dean didn't know who he was mad at anymore.

He let go of the wheel and looked down at the floor, weak, ashamed. He wondered how many times his brother must have felt exactly like this in the last few weeks. But Dean kept his mouth shut. It was all he could do. His last defense.

"I lied to you, earlier today," Sam said quietly. "There is one thing you did that screwed me up a little. When I was hurt, when I was afraid, when I needed somebody to be proud of me, you were there. You were always there to help."

"Sounds horrible, Sam," Dean snarked humorlessly. "Where is this—"

"But you never let me help you. I never got to give you anything back," Sam interrupted, as though Dean hadn't said anything at all.

"That's—"

"Just let me finish," Sam said sternly, his voice steady despite the ancient tears pooling in his eyes. "I knew I needed you, Dean. I wanted to know you needed me, too."

Dean's heart skipped a beat, his stomach turning over at the absolute absurdity of that, of Sam doubting he was needed. Words failed him. Sam jumped in again before he could protest.

"I always knew you guys loved me," Sam quavered. "But I didn't know why. It's like you were stupid or blind or something, and sooner or later you were going to figure out that you'd be better off without me."

God. That made the worst kind of sense. Dean's voice sounded like he'd swallowed a handful of rocks: "So you left."

"That's not why. But it made it easier."

Dean looked at the floor again because he could feel he was about to lose it. He needed Sam, but he couldn't just say that. He needed him to knowit. Needed him not to doubt it.

There was only one thing to do. "I killed Washington," Dean finally confessed.

"I know, you told me. Self-defense. That's not your fault," Sam replied.

"It wasn't."

"He could have tried again—" Sam said after a concerned pause.

Dean didn't even let him finish. "Not for a couple of centuries."

Sam was silent and attentive, looking at him with deep love and sadness.

"I caught him out at an old cabin he used—I found a map in his journal. Waited for him to come out and then bull-rushed him up against a tree. He fell down, I drew my gun. I told him to apologize." Dean was forcing himself to continue, not knowing how his brother would react but knowing he needed to finish regardless. "He wouldn't, so I shot him in the knee."

Dean looked forward, at the windshield.

"He screamed and said he was sorry. I didn't believe him. I shot him in the other knee. Then the elbow. He just kept screaming he was sorry, over and over," Dean paused, his voice trembling. "I said, 'good,' and I shot him in the head."

He wiped his eyes on his sleeve, half-glancing at Sam but not able to meet his eyes. He wasn't trying to hide—he was done with that, at least for now—he was just afraid of what he'd see. The truth was so ugly, he couldn't imagine Sam would ever look at him the same way again.

Then he felt a large hand, warm and heavy, on his shoulder. He looked up, looked at his brother. Nothing in Sam's eyes had changed; the love was still there.

"I'm a killer, Sam," Dean said uncertainly, unable to correlate his admission with Sam's absolution.

"Yeah," Sam answered, "You shouldn't have done that."

Dean looked away.

Sam's hand stayed on his shoulder. "I'd have done the same thing."

"No, you wouldn't."

"You don't think I'd kill for you?"

Dean knew he would. He had.

Dean couldn't hold it in any longer. He leaned forward, resting his forehead against the steering wheel, burying his face in his arms. Sam's hand slid to his brother's back as Dean trembled.

"Why does it feel like this?" Dean asked, because he hadn't gotten an answer the last time.

"Because you're a good guy," Sam said. "Even if you don't feel like it."

He _didn't_ feel like it, but Sam was the smart one; Dean would have to take his word for it.

* * *

Sam came out of the bathroom fresh from the shower, clad in shorts and a t-shirt. Even now, almost an hour later, he was still flushed from the exertion at the gym; he felt hot despite his light clothing and bare feet. He crossed the room, past Dean's bed, to his own and sat down on top of the covers, back against the headboard. It felt good to rest.

Dean, who had showered first, was reclined in a position similar to his, similarly dressed down, his food beside him on the bed. It was largely untouched, which was a little weird considering that Dean was usually an eating machine. Sam figured it made sense given the context, though. His brother was working through some pretty serious stuff. The triple bacon cheeseburger and onion rings were probably the furthest things from his mind.

The TV was on, a History Channel presentation on the Battle of Leyte Gulf. That was…surprising. Enough so that Sam decided to break the quiet. "So," he started. "How about that Second World War?"

"I like the explosions," Dean replied.

Sam gave his brother an appraising look before realizing he had no reason to: Dean wasn't hiding how he felt. He turned back to the bag of food on his bed and started unpacking it.

They sat there for several minutes. Sam made good time downing his crispy chicken sandwich and fries, watching TV. Dean was onto something with the program. Watching ancient footage of battleships unloading broadside fusillades at each other was bizarrely soothing.

Out of nowhere, Dean suddenly picked up the remote and muted the television. Sam turned his head to look at Dean just as he finished crumpling up the packaging from his now-gone food and depositing it in the takeout bag. Dean slowly swung his legs over the side of his bed, planting his feet on the ground and curling his toes as he faced Sam.

"I have something I need to tell you, Sam," Dean started in a low, quiet voice, looking primarily at the ground but occasionally glancing up to meet Sam's eyes. "I thought I could keep it from you, I thought you didn't need to know. It's hard for me to get it through my skull that you're not a kid anymore, but after everything…you deserve the truth."

An anxious knot started to form in Sam's stomach, and he sat forward a little, off the headboard. He turned to face Dean, right leg going to the floor, left folded in front of him on the bed. "What is it?" he asked.

"It's not bad," Dean said quickly, punctuating the last word with one of his glances up at Sam. "At least, I don't think it is. Before I say it, though, I need you to promise me you'll let me finish explaining before you freak out."

Sam nodded wordlessly; he needed to know, of course he'd promise. He just hoped it was a promise he'd be able to keep.

"I lied to you about what happened on the hill," Dean started.

The knot in Sam's stomach tightened. He put his right arm across his chest defensively, grabbing his left arm at the biceps. He'd known something wasn't right, but he'd dismissed it. How stupid was he?

Dean stopped looking up at Sam completely now. "The plan didn't go smoothly. Some shit went down, things got crazy. The demon got out and he had us."

Even though Sam still couldn't remember the details, this sounded familiar, triggered familiar emotions. He recalled a sense of panic, of guilt, of total desperation. His heartbeat quickened, breath shortened, throat constricted. His feeling of exposure intensified, and he pulled his foot off the floor and sat cross-legged on the bed.

Dean paused for what felt like a long time. Sam's trepidation kept him from pushing.

"He started working on me. Made you watch. You were hallucinating too, I think, and whatever you were seeing wasn't nice. Then, right when he was about to finish me off, you…changed," Dean continued ominously. "I don't know exactly what happened—I was out for a few minutes—but when I woke up, you were fighting the demon, one-on-one, and you were beating the shit out of him. You were hitting him really hard, dodging stuff you shouldn't have been able to see coming, just tooling him with everything you could get your hands on."

"I was—" Sam cleared his throat and looked away from Dean. "I was using my abilities?"

"Yeah."

Sam's stomach completely turned over and his chest tightened. Tears welled in his eyes. Only the promise he'd made prevented him from disintegrating entirely.

"You…electrocuted him or something, pinned him on top of the altar." Dean's eyes were pained, too. Apparently there was a way this could get worse. "Something let the demon out of the pastor's body, then smoked it. You…had the machete."

A gasp came up in Sam's throat. "I…," he started, unable to finish.

"You did what you had to."

* * *

Dean reached out and put a hand on his brother's knee, but Sam pulled away and stood, walking shakily over to the opposite wall, leaning into it, pressing both his palms against it. After a moment's consideration, Dean stood, too, coming up behind his brother. Not too close, but close enough to convey that he wasn't going away. He looked at the back of his brother's head, since he couldn't see Sam's face.

"You didn't do anything wrong," Dean said softly.

"I went darkside. I killed an innocent person," Sam replied, anguished.

"You used your powers. Stopped the demon. Saved the town. Saved me," Dean said. "And yeah, you killed a guy who had a few awful minutes of life left. It was the only thing you could do, the best option you had. It would have been wrong not to." Dean came up even closer, leaning in, trying to get a look at his brother's face.

"I lost control," Sam grunted.

"You didn't," Dean interrupted. "I saw it, man. The last thing in your eyes before I went out. You made a decision."

"That's not better," Sam half-whispered, probably because he was having trouble speaking normally.

"Yes, it is. It means you were in charge. That you can control it," Dean said. He paused as his own emotions began to overcome him, pride swelling his chest. "You had a choice. You could have given up. You could have let the whatever-it-was win. God knows no one could have blamed you. But you didn't. No, you faced the thing that scares you the most, and you used it to kick that demon's ass. You're a hero, Sammy. I'm proud of you."

Sam didn't say anything, but Dean heard him whimper. He took another step in.

"And you did it to keep me safe," Dean continued, his own voice starting to strain now. "That means a lot to me. Don't make it into something ugly."

Sam slowly turned around, leaning back against the wall and facing his brother, folding his arms across his chest. He was fighting back tears, unsuccessfully from the looks of it, but he wasn't hiding anymore.

"You did the right thing," Dean repeated.

"I know," Sam whispered, quickly nodding his head. "It just—doesn't feel like it." His face contorted in pain; some feelings just wouldn't be denied.

Sam looked at Dean, briefly met his brother's eyes, and Dean could tell that there was more to it than that. He thought that he might have to prod his brother further, but before he could, Sam spoke again.

"I'm scared, Dean," he admitted simply, honestly. "Of what I am. What I can do. Why aren't you?"

"Because you're standing here crying over something you did, even though you know it was the right thing. You're the best man I know, Sam. And nothing that demon did to you changes who you are."

Another wave of anguish seemed to hit Sam. He was pretty much at his limit. "Can I freak out now?" the kid asked meekly.

"Yeah," Dean replied, almost relieved.

After a moment of hesitation, Sam lurched forward, arms enveloping his brother, head dropping to Dean's shoulder. Dean had to overcome his surprise and his instinct to pull away, but once he did, he embraced his brother back. It was weird; neither of them ever reached out for the support they needed. Comfort was almost always forced on the recipient after things had broken. This felt better, so much better.

As Sam cried quietly against him, Dean hoped today's honesty would survive the things they'd face tomorrow.

* * *

Sam clung to his brother, aware of how strange this was but unwilling to let go. He needed this. He'd needed it for a long time. Almost two years of pent-up fear and self-doubt was flooding out of him as he sobbed on Dean's shoulder. He wondered how they'd let it get this far, why he hadn't truly faced it before now.

His disorder had been horrible, had wrought pain, confusion, and chaos. But in its wake they were left with knowledge of their weaknesses, and a chance to build a new, stronger order between them.

In the warmth of his brother's embrace, Sam realized he wouldn't trade that chance for anything.


End file.
